With one more point than Boston, the Isles are in the seventh spot in Eastern Conference and can make it three with a win tonight. If there was a big game this season, this may be it. After scoring three shorthanded goals and getting another three against the Carolina Hurricanes earlier in the week, the Isles could definitely use another offensive outburst.

Boston is another team that has been going through their fair share of problems, dealing with injuries to Manny Fernandez, Patrice Bergeron, Tim Thomas and Glen Murray over the course of the year. Just like the Islanders, they’ve also had problems scoring. Nonetheless, they still have players like Marc Savard, Phil Kessel and Zdeno Chara that can’t be allowed any space on the ice. If they get the space they need, they will burn the Islanders every chance they get.

The key to an Islanders victory tonight will be their physicality. If guys like Trent Hunter, Brendan Witt, Sean Bergenheim and Freddy Meyer can establish a physical presence and lure the Bruins into some dumb penalties, the Isles powerplay will then have to finish the job. If they’re aren’t a lot of penalties, this game is going to be a tight one, as these teams are extremely similar [despite the fact that the Isles don’t have a real first line and the Bruins have a legitimate first line center].

Tim Thomas is coming off of a really start as well, giving up four goals in two periods against the Canadiens. The other goalie on the Bruins Alex Auld, gave up four goals on seven shots. If the Isles can pepper the net with shots, play physically and get an early lead, this is going to be a fun game to watch if you’re an Islander fan. However, like the game against Edmonton a few weeks ago, if the Isles don’t take advantage of opportunities and give the dangerous players on the Bruins room to shoot, it doesn’t matter who is in the net, the Isles will be in deep trouble.

Last year at the All-Star Break, I’m pretty sure the Isles won their last game to get to the .500 mark. This year has been quite different as far as the win total goes through the first 50 games of the season, but the situation is the same. The Isles are on the brink of not making the playoffs and need to start playing as consistent as they possibly can. Getting the win tonight is a good way of starting that process.

Three shorthanded goals and a solid game by Wade Dubielewicz turned this into an entertaining game, don’t you think. It also seems that Mike Sillinger isn’t dealing with anymore nagging injuries and is ready to start contributing more. Seeing guys like Sean Bergenheim, Blake Comeau and Brendan Witt get goals as well might be exactly what this team going offensively.

Speaking of Comeau, this guy has matured so much over the past few weeks that I don’t want to think about what this team decides to do once Chris Simon is ready to come back. As far as I’m concerned, Comeau is one piece of the future of this team. Simon and his shenanigans are in the past. I just hope the Islanders organization understands that and gives players like Comeau every opportunity to prove just how talented and dependable they can be.

When talking about players that are talented and dependable, Dubie’s play over his past six starts has been rock solid. Take away the goal that deflected off of a skate and then the top of his stick and he would have stole the show. In the third period, when the Canes were pounding the net with shots, Dubie did more than hold his own. That’s what this team needs from their backup goaltender and it looks like the shaky starts he had earlier in the season where just a mirage.

Did you guys see that?- Before Sillinger’s second shorthanded goal of the game, one of the zebras called Richard Park for a hand pass in his own zone. Seeing the shocked look on Park’s face after the call was made had me in stitches as well. It’s not often when a player can legitimately argue a call with a referee, so I guess Park had some choice words to go along with the smirk on his face. With all the focus on drugs in professional sports as of late, I wonder if officials get tested on a regular basis. If they don’t, they should start.

On another note, since I was at Monday’s game, I didn’t find out about Chris Campoli’s season ending shoulder surgery until last night. It seems that Campoli has been suffering for quite some time and his shoulder had popped out of the socket on numerous occasions. Luckily, Freddy Meyer has been playing solid hockey over the past few games and the loss of Campo hasn’t stung as much as it could have. The Isles also shortly thereafter after announcing Campoli’s surgery signed Meyer to a two-year contract extension. This has the possibility of making things on the Isles blue line look intriguing for next season.

Regardless of all that though, the Isles still have another game to play before the All-Star Break with Boston, where they can solidify the seventh spot in the Eastern Conference if they get the win, making it one of the biggest games of the year so far.

Well, another game with Carolina. Hopefully, the pace isn’t as lackluster as it was yesterday. For one, the Islanders need to start finishing more on offense. Four losses in overtime over the course of their past ten games is absolute proof of that.

I know I’ve said that players like Ruslan Fedotenko and Josef Vasicek are on pace for their usual numbers this year, but I forgot to mention that they’re getting more ice-time this season than they’ve pretty much ever gotten over the course of their NHL careers. They need to start producing more. There’s no other way to say it.

Sure, people like Richard Park, Tim Jackman and Blake Comeau are working their tails off every night, grinding it out in the corners and Bill Guerin is starting to score more, but the people that the Isles spent money on last season need to start producing. Fedotenko’s scored 26 goals in this league before and with the ice time he’s getting, he should have twice as many goals as he has now. Vasicek, on the other hand, needs to park his rear in front of the crease more.

During yesterday’s game, he was taking low percentage shots, instead of looking to start a cycle and get in front of the net. Then, once he and his line started to cycle, Vasicek was auditioning as Wayne Gretzky behind the net instead of getting in front of the net and scoring garbage goals.

However, despite the play of Fedotenko and Vasicek over the past few weeks, Miroslav Satan has been the biggest offensive disappointment on this team. He’s showed flashes of brilliance at times, and yesterday he was playing well in both ends, but he has to start to develop some type of consistency and start scoring. Satan is supposed to be a sure-fire 30-goal scorer. This season though, he’s been on pretty much every line the Isles have because he can’t get going for any prolonged period of time. If Vasicek starts doing his thing in front of the net and Sean Bergenheim can start finishing as well, Satan will have things much easier. Nevertheless, despite Vasicek’s size and Bergenheim’s tenacity, Satan is obvious the skill player on that line and it all starts with him.

If this team can start producing more on offense, they can begin to separate themselves from rest of the other mediocre teams in the East that are barely hanging on to their playoff hopes. They have an All-Star goaltender; they just have to start supporting him more.

For the second time in as many games, the Isles coughed up a two-goal lead. Make no mistake about it, even though the Isles came out with a point and are still right in the middle of a playoff race, this is the time of the season when the Isles have to start padding points against conference rivals and start building for the postseason, not giveaway points.

Today, the Isles were scratching away at the Hurricanes, rather than knocking them down. With a two-goal lead, the Isles should have clamped down on defense and continued to establish a cycle in the offensive end. In a few weeks, when the season starts to wind down, the Islanders will start to understand that they controlled their fate all along. They could have chosen between life and death. Let’s hope they make the right decision.

Speaking of decisions, over the past few games, the Islanders have had to take the road less-traveled, playing without both of their top two defensemen as far as ice-time is concerned, Radek Martinek and Brendan Witt. With them back in the lineup, the Isles got to take some pressure off of guys like Freddy Meyer [who played another heck of a game today] and Bruno Gervais. However, Martinek and Witt weren’t exactly sharp. They were both using the stick, rather than their skates to keep up with the speedy Carolina forwards that came in the offensive zone.

Nevertheless, while a few Islanders got away with penalties [despite another solid game, Blake Comeau was slashing everything within a five-foot radius], Carolina got away with several cross-checks earlier in the game on Bill Guerin while Ruslan Fedotenko looked like he was being beaten with a Singapore cane by the Sandman. However, nothing was called and Andy Sutton got called for a crease-clearing cross check on Rod Brind’Amour in the third that led to a powerplay goal that ended the game.

Let me be the first to say that officiating a game in this league is a tough job. Regardless of what you do, you haven’t done enough or even worse, you do too much. Nevertheless, this game should have had a few powerplays for both sides. It not only would have sped things up when the game needed a jump and would have possibly added a few more goals. That’s what the NHL is trying to do, right?

Hopefully, with another game against Carolina tomorrow, the Isles can put it together and get the win. After getting some of the rust off today, Martinek and Witt should be ready to play their typical 25-minute game and guys like Miroslav Satan and Andy Hilbert can use their performances as jumping points and start seriously producing more.

On another note, I just want to thank Gary and Claire Harding for inviting me to brunch at the Marriot and today’s game. They are absolutely the first family when it comes to Islander fans and made me feel like I was watching the game at home with my family, instead of with 16,000 other people on an Island that I don’t visit nearly as much as I should.

From the first day I started this site, Gary has been an awesome guy and has turned into someone that I consider a good friend. His wife, Claire, has also been a complete sweetheart as well and has been nothing but great to me from the day we crossed paths. As far as stimulating hockey conversations is concerned, these two know their stuff and are as down to earth and humble as anyone can be. To me, they are the biggest hockey fans I know and are the standard to how smart and knowledgeable real fans should be.

Gary too, if you guys don’t already know, is one of the most insightful bloggers on the internet, no false modesty or arse-kissing needed.

Thanks guys, you rule.

Sorry for such a late post today guys, but between watching two great football games and being in another borough all day, I couldn’t find the time to write about yesterday’s debacle of a game. Now, I however do have that time, so here it goes.

The first period started pretty well, didn’t it? The Islanders scored more in the first period than Tommy Lee does when he goes on tour [I heard that somewhere today, so I figured hey, why not use it] and things looked pretty good. Aaron Johnson, who is filling in for Chris Campoli, who is nursing a shoulder injury he suffered during the game against the Devils, made a few solid plays on defense and the rest of the patchwork defense core was holding together admirably.

However, what was even more impressive was the fact that the Isles came back after being down early and with Richard Park leading the way, they got back in the game and took the lead. Even Miroslav Satan and Josef Vasicek, who haven’t been pulling their fare share on the offensive end over the past 20 games, got involved. I said yesterday that if they [among a few other players] got going, this team wouldn’t have a problem scoring. For the first 20 minutes, I looked like a modern-day Nostradomus.

Then, just like the old Dog’s Eye View song, everything fell apart. However, unlike the mid-nineties one-hit wonder, the Islanders didn’t have a conversation with god and put everything back together. Instead, they just continued to fall apart. When Flyers head coach John Stevens called a timeout after the Isles got the 3-1 lead, his team got a verbal smackdown that seemed to wake them up. At first, when seeing him call a timeout at such an early point in the game, I originally began to remember how many times Mike Milbury tried to pull that same gag, with the result ALWAYS blowing up in his face.

Nevertheless, Stevens’ ploy for his team to step it up and get their act together worked and the Islanders defense fell apart. Unfortunately, unlike the other night against New Jersey, Rick DiPietro couldn’t be the team’s saving grace, and thanks to a few weird bounces and second chances, the Flyers skated out of Nassau with a 5-3 win.

Simply put, this team needs Radek Martinek, Brendan Witt and Chris Campoli back as soon as possible. Sure, Freddy Meyer has stepped it up and Bryan Berard, Andy Sutton and Bruno Gervais are capable of playing 20 minutes a game if they have to, they need the grit and passion that Witt, Martinek and Campoli bring to the ice every night.

Writer’s note: Expect another late night posting tomorrow as I will be attending my first Islanders game as a fan since the 2001-2002 season and have to hitch a ride on the LIRR during the early morning hours. If you see me, feel free to stop me and either show me some love or berate me. Hope to see a few of you there.

Make no mistake about it, tonight is going to be another good test for this bunch of misfits known as the New York Islanders. The Flyers have gotten points in nine of their last ten games and have a ton of talent on both the blue line and forward lines. Players like Daniel Briere, Mike Richards and Kimmo Timonen are starting to get comfortable playing there and they’re is team is winning because of it.

However, on the other side of the ice, the Islanders have a few players playing great hockey right now as well. Bill Guerin has 12 goals and 15 points in his past 19 games, while Mike Sillinger has nine points in his past nine. Mike Comrie also has 11 points in his 12 games. Sure, those numbers pail in comparison to the offensive juggernauts on the Flyers, but at least this team is starting to get steady contributions from the players they need to.

Earlier in the season, getting consistent offense from anyone besides Comrie was pretty much a crapshoot. Now at least the Islanders, who have a half-dozen players over the 20-point mark, have more options than before. The cataylistic [I just made up that word by the way] play of Richard Park has also helped the Isles get some points on the board this season. As a result, teams may have to start preparing differently against them.

Now, if they could only get Miroslav Satan, Josef Vasicek and Sean Bergenheim to finish on the ice a little more, then they’d be solid.

I’ve also been having conversations with people lately about how disappointed they are in the play of a certain Islander… named Ruslan Fedotenko. As far I’m concerned, I think he just started the season hot. He’s on pace for a 14-goal, 40-point season. Last time I checked, that’s pretty much what he does every season. Sure, it would have been nice for him to break out and score 30 goals this year, but I don’t think it’s going to happen.

Just like Fedotenko, Vasicek too started his season playing very well and cooled off. Looking at where his season is going, he’s on pace for the type of season he usually puts in and will probably have anywhere from 15-18 goals and 30-35 points. Again, just like Rusty, Vasicek has the potential to score more goals and be a more complete player, but I don’t think that is going to happen this year either.

Out of the bunch of these players though, I think Bergenheim and Satan are the biggest disappointments. Bergie works his tail off every night and gets plenty of opportunities, while Satan is supposed to be a top-line winger. Instead, hasn’t been able to finish and has been on more lines this year than a fat man at Dunkin Donuts.

If these guys can start to contribute more and Guerin, Comrie and Sillinger can stay consistent, this team shouldn’t have a problem scoring goals.

Against a team with the offense of Philadelphia, the Isles better hope these players start producing tonight.

After injuring his knee in practice earlier in the season, Aaron Johnson is back with the Isles. How much playing time he gets remains to be scene though. If the Isles are content on giving him a shot, with Freddy Meyer and Bryan Berard starting to get more ice time, that means one of them is going to have to sit. As far as I’m concerned, Johnson is young and will benefit from more time in Bridgeport. Why the Islanders seem so content on bringing him to the show with capable defensemen filling in for other more than capable defensemen is intriguing.

Could they be shopping Berard or Meyer? I guess we’ll know more in a few weeks, when Brendan Witt and Radek Martinek and ready to come back. Then the Isles will have three extra defensemen with plenty of NHL experience under their belts. With players like Ruslan Fedotenko, Miroslav Satan and Josef Vasicek struggling as of late and youngsters like Jeff Tambellini, Franz Nielsen and Kyle Okposo in Bridgeport itching for a shot, the Isles could make a deal that could get them a dependable forward and then give a few youngsters playing time. Is it far-fetched? Maybe, but I’m sure we’ve all seen crazier things happen, we’re Islander fans after all.

Speaking of Tambellini and Okposo, those two are heating it up together in the AHL. Both averaging over a point per game since KO [I like the sound of that already; you know what, I just trademarked it] arrived on the scene, who knows how long it’ll be until they’re both on the Island for good. Tambellini has had chances before, but this season should be his last in the AHL. He’s accomplished everything the Isles could have expected him to there. Now it’s time for them to give him a shot at the NHL level. Okposo on the other hand, may wind up moving up faster than anyone else expects him to.

In other news, Wade Dubielewicz has been sent to Bridgeport on a conditioning stint and Mike Morrison has been called up to fill in for him. With DP healthy and playing well, who knows how long it’s going to be until Dubie gets another start. Now at least the guy will be able to stay sharp and come back and maybe get a start in before the All-Star break. Morrison I think actually has more NHL experience than Dubie and will be able to hold his own if DP gets injured.

With that being said, it’s obvious the Isles are trying to protect themselves from a mid-season slump, by keeping so many players ready to go at any time. In a fe weeks, we’ll be able to see how these moves have panned out.