Quick trivia: When was the last time the Islanders had three first period goals?
Answer per TSN:
The three goals matched New York’s best first period of the season. The Islanders hadn’t managed as many as two since they netted three in the opening 20 minutes of the season on Oct. 5 at Buffalo.
That’s right, the Isles scored three separate times, coming from deficits of 1-0 and 2-1 to tie and eventually getting the go ahead for a 3-2 lead.
Goals: Hilbert, Comrie and Guerin
Assists: Park, Comrie, Guerin, DiPietro, Berard
Hilbert has really found his groove between Comeau and Jackman. Our first line is also clicking with Park – a god send.
Hopefully they keep the Leafs off the board here in the second.
Post Game Comments
Well – the second period was rather boring and went by very fast, however Rick DiPietro went missing at the start of the second period – and nobody knew what had happened. The third wasn’t much to write home about either, there were a few more scoring chances per side in the period and each goaltender made some good saves. Dubie came up huge at times, although Toronto managed a short handed goal on our powerless powerplay.
Down to the end of the third, Dubie came up with three or four consecutive saves while the Islanders were down a man. He complimented Brendan “The Warrior” Witt for blocking so many shots – because he claimed they would’ve went in had he not blocked them. Dubie also said that Witt scares him sometimes the way he talks about pain (We can certainly see why – Witt is an animal and a true warrior).
In OT Dubie made a few great stops to keep the Islanders in the game, but all it took was Richard Park to deftly intercept the puck (from Jason Blake none-the-less) and took a shot – Comrie buried the rebound for the game winner. Park is certainly turning into the clutch player we need and nobody saw coming. Comrie was on fire out there tonight, I was tempted to ask him what he ate over the holidays because we need him to repeat his performance tonight.
Overall, this was a very big win tonight. We go on the road for a brief road trip and we will be without DiPietro for the time being. Joey MacDonald was called up from Bridgeport to back up Dubie for the game tommorow night in Ottawa.
More news on DiPietro: DP had “tweaked” his knee in the warmup and attempted to give it his all in the first period, but later decided it would be best to sit the rest of the game out. Dubie stated during the interview that he saw Rick cringe a time or two and knew there would be the possibility of coming on cold. He said stopping the first shot “for once” was a big confidence booster and felt more and more comfortable as the game went on. DiPietro will be reevaluated tomorrow and no word on if he is will accompany the team to Ottawa.
It might be worth mentioning that Blake got stripped by Park on the game-winning rush, after Blake was booed for most of the game. I was surprised by this. He had his ups and downs on the Island, but he usually played his heart out. And it’s hard to fault the guy for taking an extra ten mil to go play in Hockey Central.
Jonathan,
Thanks for letting me know I missed this key detail – I corrected my oversight.
I was a bit surprised by the booing towards Blake also, but it is what it is. Not every fan will do the right thing when a former player comes to town. I think it was more out of hurt feelings than anything else. We don’t boo Peca when he visits, likely because he was traded and did not make the decision to leave on his own.
I stood and gave Blake a few claps out of support.