Kyle Palmieri’s gutsy play in his final seconds on the ice immediately after suffering a lower-body injury started the Islanders’ rally from a three-goal deficit.
The Islanders, who hadn’t scored a power-play goal in seven games, even got one, though they couldn’t convert on a four-minute opportunity late in the third period.
They lost to the Flyers 4-3 in a shootout on Friday at UBS Arena and fell to 1-2-1 on their seven-game homestand. Travis Konecny scored the deciding shootout goal.
The Islanders (13-9-3), already without third-line center Jean-Gabriel Pageau (upper body/week to week) and defenseman Alexander Romanov (right shoulder/injured reserve) lost Palmieri at 5:42 of the second period as he got his leg twisted behind the Flyers’ crease.
David Rittich shook off allowing two goals on the first three shots he faced to make 18 saves. Samuel Ersson stopped 28 shots for the Flyers (13-7-3).
Palmieri got an assist before limping off the ice and down the tunnel to the Islanders’ room, retrieving the puck after he regained his skates and getting it to Jonathan Drouin. Referee Eric Furlatt nearly whistled the play dead with Palmieri down for a lengthy period before painfully getting back up.
Drouin touched the puck to Emil Heineman in the slot, who matched the 10 goals he scored as a Canadiens’ rookie last season to make it 3-1 at 5:42 of the second period. Heineman also hit the right post and the crossbar in the third period.
No. 1 overall pick Matthew Schaefer skated into the left circle for a wrister to make it 3-2 at 8:11 of the second period with a delayed penalty pending against Garnet Hathaway for high sticking.
Anders Lee then tipped Schaefer’s blue-line shot to tie it at 3-3 with 46.8 seconds left in the second period for the Islanders’ first power-play goal since the first period in Las Vegas on Nov. 13.
The Flyers took a 1-0 lead on their second shot at 8:30 of the first period as Tyson Foerster pickpocketed Heineman of the puck in the Islanders’ zone and beat Rittich from the high slot. That became 2-0 at 8:52 as Sean Couturier intercepted defenseman Tony DeAngelo’s errant pass in the Islanders’ zone for a second unassisted goal.
Trevor Zegras’ power-play goal off defenseman Ryan Pulock’s skate at 1:55 of the second period made it a three-goal lead and snapped the Islanders’ 10-for-10 penalty kill streak over the previous six games.
Notes & quotes: Defenseman Travis Mitchell, 26, an undrafted free agent out of Cornell in his third season in the Islanders’ organization, made his NHL debut . . . Schaefer became the youngest defenseman in NHL history with eight goals in his first 25 games . . . Defenseman Adam Boqvist and forward Max Tsyplakov were the healthy scratches.
Andrew Gross joined Newsday in 2018 to cover the Islanders. He began reporting on the NHL in 2003 and has previously covered the Rangers and Devils. Other assignments have included the Jets, St. John’s and MLB.