Ilya Sorokin made 26 saves and Bo Horvat’s first-shift goal stood up as the only marker the Islanders needed two earn them two crucial points, in regulation, in a virtual must-win meeting with the surging Columbus Blue Jackets.
It was a gusty performance by the Isles, who were missing Ryan Pulock and relied heavily on Carson Soucy to consume some of those minutes. In comparison to the night before in Montreal, they were much more responsible in preventing neutral zone transitions and in covering second and third attackers once Columbus gained the zone. Both teams were playing after traveling for the second half of a back-to-back.
But this win doesn’t happen without Sorokin, who notched his league-leading seventh shutout of the season and franchise-leading 29th all-time shutout. (He also tied his own single-season record of seven, one he shares with himself, Semyon Varlamov and Chico Resch.) We’re in the presence of greatness with this goalie, and if the rest of the Islanders roster were in a different phase, we might be talking about how he could lead them on a long Cup run.
Instead, as it stands, he and Matthew Schaefer are the engines driving a playoff push that wasn’t much expected before the season began; tonight’s 1-0 win puts them back into position, if only temporarily, in the second wild card spot.
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Horvat’s goal came at 1:25 as he took an Anders Lee bank off the glass down the right wing and beat Jet Greaves far post. The second assist was credited to Adam Boqvist, who logged 12:03 in his rare appearance with Pulock out.
There was, of course, little indication at that time that it would be the only goal of the game. Even as play entered late in the third period, the Islanders’ recent history of failing to close out games late in regulation was haunting in the background.
On the other hand, Sorokin was having one of his nights, rebounding firmly after allowing six goals the previous night in Montreal. If it was going to happen, it was going to be a scenario like where Sorokin saw everything, anticipated the third pass and was there to accept the one-timer in his bread basket, while the forwards were disciplined in fronting shots from outside and the defensemen made the extra efforts to clamp down on sticks.
A bounce here or there and it’s a very different night, but not whenever any of those bounces were in Sorokin’s range to control.
And really, it shouldn’t have only been one goal. Anders Lee was briefly credited with an important insurance marker when Horvat rushed down the wing again and played a shot off Greaves’ pad. Greaves was above his crease after he made the save, and Lee and Mathieu Olivier crashed into the vacated crease chasing the rebound. Lee tried to stop, the both of them crashed to the ice, and Olivier’s leg pushed the puck over the line.
There was no shot for Greaves to play. There was no disruption by Lee to prevent Greaves from playing a puck that his own teammate knocked over the line. They were about to drop the ensuing center-ice faceoff when Rick Bowness finally stopped them to issue a coach’s challenge. The video review took incredibly wrong, indicating — if nothing else — this was not an obvious miss by the on-ice call so they’d have to come up with something good to call the goal off.
They called the goal off.
It was different and yet eerily reminiscent of the same team and a similar high-stakes situation almost one yaer ago today:
Whatever, the NHL can’t decide what goalie interference is and it will probably cost them at a critical moment in the playoffs. Whenever that happens…it’ll probably be Buffalo on the losing end in a Stanley Cup final and everyone will just forget about it.
The Islanders went 0-for-3 on their power play, though they had some good looks and continued a generally better approach that they’ve shown since the Olympic break. The Blue Jackets received zero power plays, which will factor in their own grievance about the night of feeling of righteousness for the Lee goal being overturned. But two of their biggest shouts for penalty calls were on maneuvers that Mat Barzal has been fined for “diving” on, so no sympathy is extended for their suffering.
After the insurance goal was disallowed, the Islanders’ push definitely faded. They let Columbus dictate the rest of the game as they went into full Trotz Mode. They bent but did not break in the final minutes, clearing pucks and fighting hard in the corners to consume clock but pretty much conceding the other half of the rink. The Blue Jackets repeatedly were allowed to regroup and dump the puck in, but they met pretty good resistance each time.
It’s not a recipe you can rely on, unless you have Ilya Sorokin.
As the final horn sounded, just after a couple more clears by Schaefer, Brendan Burke pronounced, “One is enough for Ilya Sorokin!”
Up Next
The Islanders continue a home-heavy schedule to finish out the season. Tuesday is another virtual “must-have” with the Blackhawks coming to town.
