After a whole lot of games over the last couple years when the Islanders could point the finger at special teams for losing, here came one in which they won squarely because of special teams.
Two power-play goals, a shorthanded goal and a five-on-three penalty kill is a pretty good way to do that.
That is what the Islanders got against the Oilers and that is what they rode to a 3-1 bounce-back win at UBS Arena.
Even the third period came with little drama — a twist on the motif that has largely defined this season.
The Islanders spent all of the final 20 minutes defending a 3-1 lead, the operative word being defending.
Even with the Oilers choosing to pull goaltender Stuart Skinner with five minutes to go, trying to take advantage of the Islanders’ inability to score into an empty net this season, the Islanders kept on defending — managing the situation until Zach Hyman tripped Noah Dobson with 3:08 to go.
At that point, Edmonton had little choice but keep Skinner in net and let the clock tick down.
Even when they didn’t score, this was special teams coming through.
“I thought our structure defensively was good for the most part all night long,” coach Lane Lambert said after just the fourth game all year his team won by multiple goals. “We protected the interior as best we possibly could.”
But the moments in which the game tilted toward the Islanders came in a second period that included 7 minutes 25 seconds of special teams.
An Islanders power play that came into the game converting at a 25.3 percent clip would only get better after Sam Gagner was called for tripping at the 2:05 mark as Anders Lee stuffed in Kyle Palmieri’s rebound less than 40 seconds into the power play, tying the game at one.
Less than 10 minutes later, with the Islanders on the power play again, Brock Nelson threaded a pass to Bo Horvat in the slot through traffic, letting No. 14 loose a wrist shot to give the Islanders a 2-1 lead.
The Oilers’ power play, dreaded in its own right, got a turn quickly after Horvat’s goal, but let up a two-on-one break after losing the puck out of the zone, which Simon Holmstrom — who else? — finished from Jean-Gabriel Pageau at the 14:10 mark to make it 3-1.
“We joke in here all the time that those two get more two-on-ones shorthanded than we do five-on-five all year,” Horvat said. “It’s insane what those guys are able to do.”
Said Holmstrom, whose six shorthanded goals lead the league: “It’s unbelievable. Never seen anything like it, but we’re definitely gonna take it.”
And then, because things were a little short on drama, Robert Bortuzzo held Connor McDavid on a clear-cut scoring chance before the power play was up, giving the Oilers 58 seconds at five-on-three.
The Islanders, whose penalty kill ranks dead last in the league, only went and killed it off.
“The blocked shots, the D-men blocked shots, [Casey Cizikas], [Cal Clutterbuck] — it’s a lot of sacrifice to do that,” Pageau said. “And obviously your best killer is your goalie. [Ilya Sorokin] was outstanding tonight. So that’s the key to success.”
Then for good measure, faced with a bench minor for too many men at the 8:24 mark of the third, the Islanders killed that one off, too — averting the sort of ditch into which they have fallen all year.
To be fair, the third period, as a whole, fell into that category.
But that is how a team whose penalty kill has been an issue all this year, whose power play was a problem all last year, goes and wins a hockey game with its special teams.
That is an important two points for a team that needed to regain its balance ahead of a pivotal pre-holiday trip against two division rivals.
And a team, by the way, that still has not lost straight games in regulation since the first time it played Edmonton, all the way back on Nov. 13.
Maybe the Isles have picked up some winning habits along the way.
