The Islanders defeated the Capitals tonight by a final score of 5-2, with Guerin netting a HAT TRICK!! What a way to get your first, second and third goals of the season – also your first, second and third as an Islander! Looks like Billy G still has that touch and it’s good to see him rewarded for his play thus far! Two of Guerin’s 3 were on the power play which was on fire tonight.

Berard also scored on the power play (game winner) and Bergenhiem had his first of the season. Berard has been a solid pick up and a great addition to the power play. Bergy has been super-solid since he was placed on the 2nd line with Satan and Vasicek. It appears that the offense is finally coming – which is huge.

For the Capitals, Ovechkin scored early in the 3rd to make it 2-1 and Fleischmann about 5 minutes later made it 2-2. The Isles were also solid on the penalty kill, keeping the Capitals power play from scoring on several occasions including a 5-on-3.

Some notables:

New line combos of Guerin, Sillinger and Hilbert looked great, although the “Free Agent Line” of Guerin, Comrie and Fedotenko was reunited for power plays.

The Hunter, Comrie and Fedotenko line worked their tails off all game, Hunter created room and they were able to grind into the corners and move around the open space made by Hunter. I think this "First" line was a bit better than the previous line, but for different reasons - mostly due to dynamic.

Also, defenseman Aaron Johnson made his Islanders debut tonight - at forward. He has played the position before in Columbus and they wanted to reward him with some ice time tonight. Unfortunately the Isles took a few penalties and the 4th line was only regulated to a few short shifts - Johnson did manage to take a penalty though.

When you get the chance, I took part in some friendly alternative perspective on a Capitals blog - Japers` Rink. Head on over there to check out the friendly banter – which may not be so friendly now that the Islanders defeated the Capitals.

I don’t know how I find this stuff sometimes, there always seems to be something interesting around the league that can be found on various sites across the net. This time right on the hometown Newsday website, they picked up an AP story on heated ice skate blades called Thermablades.

After reading the Newsday story, I decided to do a little more digging.

Basically, these blades use a battery and a microprocessor to heat the blades to a temperature above freezing that in turn decreases friction on the blade - which will allow for better on ice control. The league is looking for a small group to test the product before allowing it for widespread use - mind you it would also need to be approved by the player’s union.

Are you a tech junky like me and need to know exactly what Thermablade is? Per the Thermablade website:

Thermablade performance-enhancing skate blades are a patented new skate technology that’s revolutionizing the game of hockey. Thermablade skate blades are heated to significantly reduce the friction of the blade gliding on the ice. You get a quicker start and skate faster, and every stride feels like you’re skating on fresh ice.

Thermablade skate blades help players at all levels of the game to become better skaters. The major benefits of Thermablade technology include:

• Faster acceleration, especially in your first 3 strides
• Tighter turns
• And increased control.

Thermablade also helps you conserve energy. With Thermablade, starting resistance is reduced up to 75% and gliding resistance is cut by up to 55%. There’s also a significant decrease in energy-robbing vibration. What it all means is that, on Thermablade skate blades, you have more energy late in the game, when it often counts most.

The key components that set a Thermablade apart from an ordinary skate blade are a battery and electronics integrated into the heel of the blade holder. These connect to a resistor which heats the blade to 5°C. A full charge lasts a minimum of 75 minutes of on-ice time, and recharging the batteries takes just 2 hours.

Where the heck was this when I was in High School? I really love when technology makes it into sports - first we get equipment and jerseys that wick moisture and now blades that stay above freezing - GENIUS! Personally, I feel that Thermablade will have just as big of an impact on the sport as aluminum and composite stick shafts. I would love to test a set of these out on my Graf’s…. (hint hint nudge nudge).

Being it's a slow day in Islanders Country - I figured I would share a bit of Linky Love today. You may be asking "What in the world is Linky Love?" as well as "Mike, I didn't think your website was so outgoing!". To those in the blogging community - you already know the idea, but for those not in the know here is a brief explanation from Blogossary's website:

Linky love is linking, usually unsolicited, to a site you enjoy, admire, or find useful.

That being said, I am sure you know what's coming. I just wanted to acknowledge all the websites who have been kind enough to pick up my posts or simply comment on my site. So now I present to you without further interruption "The List" (So anti climactic eh?).

James Mirtle, a sports desk staffer for The Globe and Mail in Toronto, has blog that is in my top ten daily sites visited. He has commented on the NYI Blog Box several times and even gave some kudos my way in his post. Check out that post, and then the rest of his site: http://mirtle.blogspot.com/2007/10/blogs-in-box.html

New York Hockey Talk is a great radio show on the AM dial that features all of the local NHL hockey teams. Its host - Rob Kowal recently had fellow Blog Boxer Dee Karl (7thWoman) on the show where they discussed the Islanders and the Blog Box in pretty good detail. Check out that segment from October 14th: http://www.nyhockeytalk.com/

The Guins Blog, a blog on the Pittsburgh Penguins also commented on the blog box - and wouldn't ya know it, referenced my take on the whole deal. Sometimes the far reach of the internet never ceases to amaze me.

Dominik, who runs Islanders Frontier over on MVN, has referenced my site a few times (He also comments regularly on my site). For those who may not know about his site - he is based in St. Louis and is surprisingly, a huge Islanders fan. Here are some of his most recent entries linking back to my site:

http://mvn.com/nhl-islanders/2007/10/04/captain-fancy-yashin-smyth-guerin/

http://mvn.com/nhl-islanders/2007/10/10/report-jon-sim-out-for-season/

http://mvn.com/nhl-islanders/2007/10/13/chris-simon-returns-tonight-in-philly/

http://mvn.com/nhl-islanders/2007/10/14/flyers-drop-isles-to-500-sim-out-for-season/

It really is a blast seeing the stuff I post here get referenced across the internet. All the sites listed (except for NY Hockey Talk) generate traffic my way, so I wanted to do the same for them. NYHT is just a great site and radio program and I felt generous enough to show them the “love”.

The other Blog Box participants have almost all linked back to me here - so please check out each of their sites listed in the Blog Roll located in the right column.

I think I'm all out of love for the night, time to recharge the batteries!

For the past week, news on the status of Islanders forward Jon Sim has been sketchy. I knew for sure he was injured in the home opener against Buffalo for two reasons, for one in the post game Press Conference the Isles VP of media relations Chris Botta addressed the room as a whole and said “Just so everyone knows, Jon Sim sprained his knee and will be re-evaluated sometime during the week”. While this may have been a shock to some, I saw the play on which Sim got caught in a rut and fell awkwardly - as a hockey player, I know that cant ever be a good thing.

There was speculation during the week by a normally reliable source on Hockeybuzz - Andy Strickland, who claimed Sim would likely miss the year. At that point Sim had yet to even get a second opinion. The rumor was shot down through an article by Greg Logan the next afternoon and even on the Islanders telecast from Toronto by FSN broadcaster Howie Rose if you happened to catch it.

Today however, the mystery is no more - as Greg Logan confirmed in a story on Sim today that he will miss the entire season with blown anterior cruciate ligament and the medial collateral ligaments in his left knee. With a recovery time of up to 9 weeks, not including therapy - Greg states that we likely won’t see him until training camp next year.

With players like Bates almost completely healed and Simon now eligible to play again, there are no shortages of players - but many in Islanders country were anticipating what Sim could bring to the team. He is a gritty player who wasn’t afraid to grind in the corners, he had playmaking ability, he was vocal, and he had some offensive upside. In my view - he was a more offensive version of Asham, so in a way it could potentially be a big loss to the team.

One thing is for certain, it appears the organization has started to take injuries more seriously and allow players to heal. Between Yashin’s knee and DiPietro’s concussions last year - this is an extremely important sign.

The only positives about tonight is we did not get blown out and there weren't glaring defensive breakdowns. Something that was a concern of mine from the start of the year is the lack of goal scoring - they really need to wake up.

Penalties - STOP TAKING PENALTIES. I understand if you take a penalty to break up a scoring chance, but I have had enough of the lazy hooking and holding calls - they will call them every time and you guys know that.

Overall, it was definately a better effort then the Toronto game, but there is still obviously work to be done.

Whenever I feel there are not enough hours in a day, I seem to stretch whatever free time I have and do something creative. What did I do tonight? I started my gallery finally, but being the person I am - I wasn’t satisfied having it open in a new page and look completely different than the site. No, I had to tear apart the gallery code and stick it in a static page so it looks like the rest of the site. The one downside, the pictures cannot be displayed in full scale - but you can always view the gallery in a new window for that.

Keep in mind I am still tweaking things with the gallery because I like everything to be as close to perfect as possible, so if you come across an issue - let me know.Here is the link: http://www.islesblogger.com/wpg2

You can also access it through the button in the navbar at the top of the page. I did not upload every shot I took from every night; I just wanted to get started for now. I will add more as time goes on.

Let me know what you think!

Update! 11/29/07 Now that I am using Wordpress, I embedded the gallery code here and it works much better.