Interesting day for the New York Islanders.
The ITV interviews on Nielsen resigning were very good. Jack Capuano/Nielsen gave a lot of insight on many subjects, including the Coliseum's future.
Islanders website: Released a summary of the comments.
First time in months/all year ITV had the coach on an off day during practice.
NYIFC Comments:
Seems a lot of players already here want to stay and seemingly took less money than they could make on the open market. It says everything about the ownership and management. Jack Capuano for his part sounded like a coach who has his own job, and that's not to be the general manager.
Dylan Reese Out:
The Islanders twitter announced Dylan Reese is out 4-6 weeks, his injury looked even worse.
Looking ahead, we know the drill.
Jurcina returns or Mottau returns (no mention of #10 skating), Donovan, Wishart recalled or Garth Snow brings in a player from another organization.
Moving Forward:
This defense as presently constructed has some major challenges moving forward, they are not going to outright steal many games like they did on Tuesday with goaltending. Aaron Ness for the most part was not noticeable in his debut, which is a good thing. He fell once early, but got some shots.
The Flyers had the ability to out-shoot the Devils 24-1 on Saturday and rally down 6-0 to lose 6-4, so give marks to the struggling Flyers, still it was their third game in four days and as that game played out, the Isles faded, Philadelphia dominated, even when the Isles drew powerplays.
Peter Laviolette had a team meeting Monday, he pushed his team and got a good response.
Now Jack Capuano has to get the same response from his team, with a defense that looks badly over-matched. Tavares line is getting chances, but has not produced the last three games, his backcheck in the third period, and move to split the Flyer defense late and draw a pp was incredible during one shift.
Josh Bailey was also very good in Philadelphia, his line had early chances.
Bottom line, NYIFC has been writing about this being an extended pre-season, the standings do not lie on that count, however the team is making things interesting without really closing the gap on the latest 8th seed.
Just getting back to five hundred from five/six under, but only a few points out of fifteenth says a lot about the team/conference.
Trade Deadline:
NYIFC gave our projection of the likely available players the other day. The next set of games/standings will determine which direction Snow goes in ultimately unless a deal comes along now that makes sense.
Nabokov looks like he's having fun being here, out of the break Poulin got the start in Carolina, Montoya got the Buffalo game after Nabokov did not face huge pressure against Ottawa so that's telling.
Nabokov's second half only proves that a goaltender can struggle or be injured for the better part of a year and a half, but when healthy/with the rust off he can return to top forum. Khabibulin did it in Edmonton this year.
Of course every players circumstances are different.
NYIFC Notables:
The archives of past entries since this blog began in 2007 are now easier to find/read on the sidebar with the drop-down menu altered. Regretfully labels were not used in postings after daily/full time entries stopped in April 2009 often.
The good news for our readers has been the Time Warner-Cablevision blackout has forced many to watch games on line. Because of that there have had many twitter updates here (sidebar/twitterpage) during most games.
The tribute header to Kenny Jonsson will be posted on Thursday and be up through Sunday afternoon.
Our twitter name for some reason was New York Islanders long before this blog used twitter here, that's been changed to NYI Fan Central.
The twitter wallpaper was redone to accommodate their recent changes. At this time there is no need for an App for NYIFC, and do not want folks spending money to read a blog.
The historical sections on the sidebars are always a work in progress, but feel it's one of the best anywhere, the prospect blog header has also been updated.
The twitter box will be back at 2pm Thursday.
