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Good Morning, Islanders Country.
There are four straight wins in the ledger now for the Islanders, and the math is the same for each: two points, standings momentum, a team quietly climbing out of its early-season ditch. But anyone who watched Thursday night knows this one was different. This wasn’t survival, or opportunism, or one kid dragging everyone else into the light (Schaefer, ironically, was held off the score sheet for the first time in his career).
The Islanders didn’t trail for the first time this season. This was a team win — the first full, wire-to-wire effort of the season. Against a Detroit Red Wings team with five wins already, no less.
The Islanders had flashed pieces of this over the last three — a period here, a push there, a stretch where the machine finally hummed. But this was the first night where it all came together and stayed together. They forechecked with purpose. They transitioned cleanly. They rolled all four lines without holding their breath. The goals were earned, not gifted.
For weeks now, the running joke — laced with more truth than satire — has been that the Islanders are fun and bad. They’d race, they’d exchange chances, they’d score, they’d leak, they’d lose. Entertaining, sure — but unserious.
Thursday night complicates that outlook in the best possible way. Because if you can play like that, structure and speed married for 60 minutes, you stop being a novelty act and you start being something worth fearing.
Maybe this is who they can be more often than not. Maybe the flashes weren’t noise, they were foreshadowing. Maybe “fun and bad” was just the introduction, and what comes next is “fun and… good?”
It’s only October. Caution is still appropriate. But for the first time this season, the Islanders didn’t just win — they looked like a team capable of stacking nights like this on purpose, not by accident. And that is how seasons change.
Game Recap
Emil Heineman scored twice and the Islanders continued their early-season turnaround with a 7–2 rout of the Red Wings on Thursday night at UBS Arena. Tony DeAngelo, Mathew Barzal and Simon Holmstrom each finished with a goal and an assist, while Jean-Gabriel Pageau and Kyle Palmieri also found the net as New York won its fourth straight after opening the year 0–3. Anders Lee recorded three assists and David Rittich stopped 29 shots.
Dylan Larkin and Jonatan Berggren scored for Detroit, which has now dropped two in a row. Cam Talbot made 23 saves in the loss.
DeAngelo opened the scoring at 2:05 of the first, finishing an odd-man rush set up by Lee. Heineman pushed the lead with his first of the night at 14:56 of the second, extending his career-long point streak to five games. Barzal closed a three-goal second period in the final minute to make it 5–0.
Holmstrom’s first of the season came 38 seconds after Heineman’s second early in the third, stretching the margin to 7–1. No. 1 pick Matthew Schaefer had his season-opening point streak end at six games.
McLellan coached his 1,200th NHL game, the 23rd most in league history.
GameScore Impact Card
⏭ NEXT UP: The Islanders start a four-game road trip with a visit to Philadelphia to battle the Flyers on Saturday afternoon.
Face-off at 12:30 PM EDT.
📊 STANDINGS
Islanders Recall Highmore and Warren; Gatcomb Assigned to Bridgeport
The Islanders announced Thursday afternoon that forward Matthew Highmore and defenseman Marshall Warren have been recalled from AHL Bridgeport. Forward Marc Gatcomb, who cleared waivers earlier in the day, has been assigned back to Bridgeport.
Warren is off to a strong start in his second full AHL season, recording five points (2G, 3A) in four games. The 24-year-old drew early league attention with a four-point burst (2G, 2A) across the opening two games, earning AHL Player of the Week honors for the period ending Oct. 12. The Laurel Hollow native posted 17 points (4G, 13A) in 53 games last season as a rookie.
Highmore has four assists in four games in his debut season with the organization. The 29-year-old brings 187 games of NHL experience with Chicago, St. Louis, Vancouver, and Ottawa. He signed a two-way contract with the Islanders this offseason after posting six points in 41 NHL games and 10 points in 23 AHL games for Ottawa/Belleville last year. Gatcomb appeared in one game for the Islanders this season, logging 8:33 and one shot on Oct. 11.
🗞 News & Notes
The roster moves come in response to injuries to Alexander Romanov (upper body, IR) and Max Shabanov (upper body, day-to-day). Separately, the club announced Pierre Engvall has been placed on Long-Term Injured Reserve (LTIR).
📚 SOUND SMART: Per Eric Hornick in The Skinny, the Isles have two players (Bo Horvat and Emil Heineman) with five goals in the team’s first seven games for the first time since 2001-02 (Mark Parrish and Alexei Yashin). Heineman extended his point streak to five games. Heineman extended his point streak to five games and added two hits; he leads the team with 29 hits.
🎥 ISLES REWIND: On October 24, 1988, the legendary Mike Bossy officially announced his retirement at only thirty-one after missing the entire 1987-88 season due to a back injury. He finished his NHL career with 573 goals and 1,126 points in just 752 games.
Via the New York Times: Bossy rested the entire summer of 1987, hoping for a training camp comeback, but on Oct. 5, 1987, he announced that he was still unable to play and would undergo physical therapy. He said he wouldn’t return to the ice unless he felt he could perform up to his own standards.
📺 Islanders Postgame Availability | NYI vs DET (10/23/25)
🔗 Islanders promote LIer Marshall Warren by Andrew Gross, Newsday “Marshall Warren’s first NHL call-up did not lead to his NHL debut on Thursday, but it still was a significant step for the Laurel Hollow product. “When I was like a 7-year-old kid, you want to be an Islander,” Warren said in September. “That’s obviously my biggest goal. I’m just trying to push myself in every direction to do that.”
🔗 NY Islanders fans calling Emil Heineman trade a heist of the Montreal Canadiens via Eyes on Isles “The enthusiasm around Heineman is not about stardom, but about value — the idea that a player originally labeled a toss-in has become a contributing piece at the NHL level while the two premium assets still sit in reserve. In an era where teams often spend half a decade rebuilding to accumulate that kind of capital, Islanders fans believe they extracted it in one deal.”
And we leave you with this… join the Hockey Night in New York watch party at Borrelli’s on Tuesday night as the Islanders visit the Boston Bruins.
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Great win!! Finally a stress free, worry free no wishing or hoping for a comeback or worrying about a blown lead game!!!! Want more of these! Actually ENJOYED the full 60 min. Shocking feeling right!!!