The first meeting between teams one season after a playoff clash often provides an opportunity to reignite some old feuds.
But on Saturday night, the New York Islanders and Carolina Hurricanes will be far more concerned with finding a spark on offense and staying out of the penalty box than revisiting the results of their Eastern Conference first-round series last spring.
The Metropolitan Division rivals will meet for the first time in more than six months when the Islanders host the Hurricanes in Elmont, N.Y.
Both teams were off Friday after playing low-scoring, penalty-filled road games against divisional foes Thursday.
Semyon Varlamov stopped all 32 shots he faced as the visiting Islanders beat the Washington Capitals 3-0, while the Hurricanes’ three-game winning streak ended with a 2-1 loss on the road to the New York Rangers.
The Islanders, who were eliminated by the Hurricanes in six games in their quarterfinal series in April, managed to win Thursday despite being outshot 32-21, including 22-9 in the first two periods. New York scored on its only two shots of the first period, when it also killed off two penalties.
“We weren’t great, for sure,” Islanders defenseman Ryan Pulock said, according to Newsday, after he scored 22 seconds into the game. “It was kind of sloppy the first couple of periods.”
Mathew Barzal was whistled for the Islanders’ last penalty 1:22 into the second, but New York limited the Capitals to just four shots over the three power play opportunities. Brock Nelson collected the final goal of the game with 8:45 remaining.
The Islanders have allowed 32 power play opportunities, the ninth fewest in the NHL entering Friday. But Thursday marked the seventh time New York has committed at least three penalties in a game.
“I think we buried our chances well,” defenseman Scott Mayfield said after he returned from a seven-game absence due to a left ankle injury. “I thought our kill was pretty good limiting chances. There’s stuff to clean up, but kind of a gritty road win and we’ll take it.”
The Hurricanes couldn’t clean up enough to earn the win Thursday, when they absorbed five penalties and fell behind just 2:41 into the game, 63 seconds after being whistled for having too many men on the ice.
It was the first of three first-period penalties for Carolina, which was outshot 11-6 over the first 20 minutes but managed to tie the game on Seth Jarvis’ power play goal 9:53 into the game.
“The first period was no good because we were in the box,” Hurricanes head coach Rod Brind’Amour said. “We were lucky to come out of that 1-1. Our power play made a nice play to tie the game. That’s all we had that period because we were in the box.”
Carolina has allowed 45 power play opportunities, third-most in the NHL entering Friday behind only the Anaheim Ducks (52) and Montreal Canadiens (48).
The Hurricanes have scored four goals and committed 10 penalties in the last two games after drawing a total of three penalties and scoring six goals combined in consecutive wins over the Seattle Kraken and San Jose Sharks on Oct. 26-27.
“Taking five penalties is not the way to win,” Hurricanes defenseman Brady Skjei said. “Trying to stay out of the box in the future is huge, especially against a team like this. We didn’t quite have it tonight.”
–Field Level Media
