New York Training Camp

New York Islander Fan Central | 9/16/2026 02:42:00 AM |
Ok, the prospect camp will be ending, the real camp opens Thursday, a four game preseason starts on Sunday. Expect few changes, Darche feels Palmieri/Romanov are the UFA additions with player from Leafs who could actually help. The rest is a group without Shabanov, Tsyplakov who had potential, and a group that scored two goals or fewer in 1/2 the games last season with Schaefer & with an improved powerplay which got them to 30th.
It was a minor miracle they got all those games to overtime/and went 10-0 in skills competition which got them to fifteen games over/6th seed on 3/29/26, a very secure playoff seeding at that time. They got 18/64 games to overtime, Schenn came in and they got his first game to overtime, that was the only one for the rest of the season.
What I wrote here on 3/29/26 was they have gotten this far, no reason they can't do it for two more weeks. Then what I expected all season came crashing down with the injuries on defense. Pens, Flyers easily popped the bubble in front of a half filled building in a location unfit for NHL.
Fair or not Roy got them to fifteen over with the swagger, compassions speeches, now it falls on Deboer to do the same and qualify this time. Likely? No.
Already the new coach is considering moving Schaefer to RD to bail out Darche massively overloading on LD. Schaefer came within inches of injuries most of last season, many times skating off hurt before returning. I think changing his position is a mistake, but the alternative is likely to move NHL-ready, Isaiah George who is a very capable LD but will not play over Darche's guy he spent 50 million for in Romanov.
Up front they are overloaded down the middle so Schenn, Ritchie or Barzal continue to play wing. Palmieri is used like Bossy, Pageau like Trottier, and Cizikas like Goring, they can't skate, defend or score with Mac-Lean, Engvall, Palat.
We'll see, there are fair reasons not to be optimistic. I am about Varlamov's return and the overall defense. Darche wants to send Cizikas, Engvall, MacLean to Hamilton with Palat for Eiserman, Eklund, I may change my mind.
Ok, short camp, drop the puck.