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Good Morning, Islanders Country.
It’s better to be lucky than good, especially when facing elimination.
The Isles did not play a great game last night, but they had enough great moments and great individual performances to find a way to stave off elimination and send this series back to Long Island.
Did I love the Isles’ effort last night? No, but this series is probably where it should be, with Carolina up three games to two heading into Game 6 at UBS Arena. For everything that went wrong for the Isles in Game 2, those bounces and breaks went their way in Game 5 to gain back a game they should’ve won.
“When you lose, you almost would rather just get beat,” Hurricanes coach Rod Brind’Amour said after the game. “We lost tonight, but I don’t know if we got beat. We were pretty good.” It wasn’t pretty, but the gutsy Islanders were just good enough, long enough, to earn a win.
Most importantly, their difference maker was on the right side of making a difference on this night. Ilya Sorokin had his most influential game of the series, keeping Carolina off the board early when they owned the better of the play and denying the Canes late as they sought the game-tying goal with the extra attacker on for over two minutes in the third.
"He's been our backbone all year," Mathew Barzal said of Sorokin. "You look at most important players in the league, to their own teams. I think he's in the top three or five.”
If there’s one thing you can say about the 2022-23 Islanders, it’s that they are resilient, often digging out of a hole they dug themselves into throughout the season. Another thing you can say about them is that they are inconsistent and unpredictable. As our emotions bounce back and forth regarding whether this team is finished or can pull off the series comeback, we have no idea what type of effort to expect on Friday night, but it sure beats the alternative.
That’s one successful stave down; two more to go.
Coming up, Pierre Engvall has a stand-out game, and Scott Mayfield does everything he can to waste time. Plus, road teams are having success away from home; Brock Nelson joins a list of Isles legends, both Aho’s serve time and Jon Ledecky pays a visit to the patrons.
Let’s dive in.
🏒 IN SHORT: Pierre Engvall scored his first postseason goal and added an assist as the New York Islanders staved off elimination and defeated the Carolina Hurricanes 3-2 in Game 5 at PNC Arena in Raleigh on Tuesday night. Engvall's goal at 10:27 was the first time the Islanders scored the opening goal of the game in 10 playoff games. Brock Nelson made it 2-0 when an Engvall shot went off the face of Carolina's Sebastian Aho and was batted into the net by Nelson out of mid-air. Mathew Barzal scored the game-winner 18:05 into the second, and Ilya Sorokin made 34 saves in the win. Paul Stasny and Aho had the Carolina goals, while Antti Raanta had 19 saves.
KEY MOMENT(s):
🔸 Trailing 1-0, Stefan Noesen appeared to tie it on a power play at 18:11, but Islanders coach Lane Lambert challenged the play for offside, and the call was reversed after a video review.
🔹 Nelson made it 2-0 at 3:16 of the second period, batting the puck out of the air after Engvall's shot from the slot hit Aho of the Hurricanes in the face.
🔸 Barzal pushed it to 3-1 at 18:05 during a 4-on-4. He elected to keep the puck and shot glove side from the left circle on a 2-on-1 with Bo Horvat, who stripped Martin Necas of the puck at the Isles blue line.
3 REACTIONS
❶ RESILIENT GROUP: "You've seen this from this group a lot this year. It's a resilient group," Anders Lee said. "Our road just to get in wasn't that easy. We had to pull ourselves out of a hole after tough stretches, but we believe in one another. We believe in this group and what we can do, and how we can play. That was no different coming into this evening."
❷ HE WAS FLYING: "I thought he was flying," Brock Nelson said of Pierre Engvall. "He did a good job hounding it and finding himself in good spots. He can generate chances by himself with his speed, so that's huge.
❸ THESE THINGS HAPPEN: "It's a break, but we've seen it all the time, you go offside, and these things happen," Lee said. "Momentum might change a little bit there, end of the period, it would be tough to give up a goal then, but we got the right call there."
GameScore Impact Card
⏭ NEXT UP: After two nights off, the series continues as the Islanders and Carolina Hurricanes head back to Long Island for Game 6 at UBS Arena.
Face off is TBD
🏆 STANLEY CUP® PLAYOFFS:
📰 NEWS: Pierre Engvall put the Islanders ahead 1-0 at 10:27 of the first period. Nelson knocked down a clearing attempt from Brent Burns and passed to Engvall, who scored five-hole on Raanta from all alone in front. The goal was the Islanders’ first 1st-period playoff goal in 10 games. The Isles led 1-0 after 20 minutes, the first time they’ve led a playoff game going into the second period in 25 games, the second-longest streak in NHL history.
◾️OLD TIME HOCKEY: A key play late in the game was Scott Mayfield pinning the puck against the boards to kill off at least 20 seconds during a late Hurricanes power play. Soon after, the Canes’ Sebastian Aho took a high-sticking penalty in the scrum, negating the man advantage.
"That's old-time hockey," Lee said of Mayfield. "It's a big scrum, and we come up with a fortunate call. I don't know how long it killed but felt like a long time."
◾️ ROAD WARRIORS: With the win on Tuesday night, the Islanders became the last team in this year’s Stanley Cup Playoffs to win a road game. It’s only the second time since the expansion era (2012) that all 16 teams won a game away from home ice in the first round of the playoffs.
◾️SEEING DOUBLE: We've seen two Sebastian Ahos on the ice at the same time this series, but in Game 5, we saw them both in the penalty box at the same time, adding to the list of matrix-altering moments between the two players which already includes committing penalties against each other and scoring seconds apart in different games.
📚 SOUND SMART: Per Eric Hornick in The Skinny, Brock Nelson is the fifth player in club history to score 25 career playoff goals in 75 games or fewer. The others have 16 Stanley Cups and four retired jerseys:
• Mike Bossy (41 GP),
• Butch Goring (68 GP)
• Bryan Trottier (70 GP)
• Brock Nelson (72 GP)
• Denis Potvin (75 GP)
🗓 ISLES REWIND: On April 26, 1993, Al Iafrate scored three times, while Ray Ferraro had four goals in the Washington Capitals 6-4 win over the Islanders in Game 5 of the Patrick Division Semifinals. This was just the second playoff game where each team had a hat trick.
“This is Ray's season right now," said Derek King after the game. The Islanders would close out the series in six games back at the Nassau Coliseum.
🎧 Eyes on Isles Podcast: Play on! On the latest edition of the Eyes on Isles Podcast, Joe Buono (@IslesFix) and Andy Francess (@AndyFrancess) react to the Islanders Game 5 win in Carolina that sends the series back to Long Island for Game 6. They talk about the stand-out play from Ilya Sorokin, the fortunate breaks that went the Islanders way, and the special teams play that continues to struggle. Plus, Lane Lambert changed lines during the game, Noah Dobson's struggles this series, and Scott Mayfield's clutch play.
🔗 Islanders avoid playoff elimination with Game 5 road win over Hurricanes by Andrew Gross, Newsday “Nothing came easy for the Islanders from the opening faceoff to the relief-inducing final buzzer after the Hurricanes skated six-on-five for more than two minutes. But they will play at least one more game this season after staving off elimination with a 3-2 win over the Hurricanes in Game 5 of their Stanley Cup first-round series on Tuesday night at PNC Arena.”
And we leave you with this …. Islanders co-owner Jon Ledecky wasn’t in Carolina on Wednesday night; he was at “Offside” in Alphabet City with Isles Nation.
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.....I actually thought they played QUITE well - considering their opponent - depleted or NOT; all 6 defensemen ACQUITTED themselves in various ways - and he who I took to referring to as 'CarolinAHO' was flat-out PUMMELED last night; a GRATIFYING sight - he's always BEEN a CHIPPY little dickens (although felt SOME remorse for that puck to the FACE.....)