Could Capuano vs Streit Mean End For Coach?

New York Islander Fan Central | 12/16/2011 10:19:00 AM |


Updated:
Per Isles twitter-Niederreiter sheds non-contact jersey; skating with Martin and Reasoner at practice today

Capuano confirms that Niederreiter has been cleared to play. MacDonald and Eaton will be game time decisions tomorrow in MIN.

Transactions: Poulin (emergency terminated) and de Haan (emergency not terminated) have been returned on loan to Bridgeport.

(MacDonald and Eaton a bit shocking.)
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Coach vs Captain is the one element that could force an immediate coaching change.

Jack Capuano was a very frustrated head coach Thursday night after the Islanders lost another game they could absolutely not afford to lose, where he lost Brian Rolston, then decided to take David Ullstrom out of his mix in a game the Islanders took a physical beating.

Capuano did not have a good night, neither did his team collectively, obviously he knows the standings and was frustrated.

In this business Capuano came as close as possible to calling out Mark Streit for his breakdowns that led to the tying and winning goals for a Dallas team, that was trailing, but controlled play for the most part with Kevin Poulin giving them any chance to win.

Absolutely Streit struggled.

Sure the second call against Tim Wallace was poor as were others, not the point.

Bottom line this general manager started talking about getting back to five hundred and making a playoff push a week ago. His team dropped every game since, lost leads and every game another key element let them down from special teams to goaltending.

Now the coach comes as indirectly close to calling out a captain, who was out for a year and given Steve Staios as his defensive partner when Streit needed a defensive partner to take the burden off him after a year without playing?

Instead Streit got a double burden.

There are playing games on offense vs defense, for Mark Streit, it seems like he's been overworked with so many games pinned in on defense, granted since MacDonald has been out Streit has mostly been paired with Travis Hamonic.

Of course that's the best player for Streit to be paired with.

When something like this happens, either the coach and captain get on the same page quickly, or someone pays the price.
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The best example I can give folks of what this defense has been missing with all the older veterans/Jurcina, watch Calvin deHaan with 7:30 left in the second period take a puck from his crease and carry the puck out of the defensive zone with speed.

deHaan was solid, but that's the element this defense needs most.
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As well as Kevin Poulin played, for a goaltender who had not started any game since December 4th (AHL) he needed to stop the 3-2 goal. Hamonic played it perfect, the shooter cannot beat him short side like that.

Of course if Poulin played avg this would have been 5-2 game for Dallas even if he stopped the 3-2 goal.
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What's Next?
Another Haley recall or perhaps Rakhshani? Do they take any chance on Niedereiter given what is an NHL concussion epidemic with players dropping everywhere?

Nabokov had a setback and is back to skating, but another groin setback could mean he's out for the duration of his contract.

Bridgeport once again seems to have more PTO's than regulars.
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On The Ice:

Unless this club can defeat Minnesota again (Montoya stole that game) go to Winnipeg and earn two points, then win at Nassau Coliseum West x2 with Toronto in-between, there will be nothing left to talk about regarding the NHL playoffs in 2011-12.

There is no hiding from the standings, even 4-0-2 only moved the needle a little.