WASHINGTON – The consistency the Islanders need to prosper through the playoff chase must be greater. The effort to get more bodies to the opponent’s net must be more determined. The attention to the smaller details that win games must be better focused.
They had a lead against an inexperienced goalie who started off struggling with his rebound control and all the motivation to put significant space between themselves and the Capitals in the Metropolitan Division. Instead, the Capitals scored twice in 31 seconds in the second period and rallied for a 4-1 win on Monday night at Capital One Arena to move within two points of the Islanders for third place.
As it stands now, that would be the final playoff position in the division with Atlantic Division teams holding five spots.
“More dialed in, probably,” Ondrej Palat said. “We made mistakes that we shouldn’t make and they’re a good team. When they got a lead they played pretty well. We had some chances, too, but we didn’t score.”
“We need to find a way to battle harder around their net, to win our battles in the corners,” Jean-Gabriel Pageau said. “I know, myself, I didn’t win all my battles I wanted in the corners to get those second pucks and keep them in their zone. I thought we did a good job trying to put a lot of pucks on net but we need traffic and we need to get our stick on those pucks.”
The Islanders (30-21-5), who have lost two straight in regulation at the worst time, face another crucial game against the second-place Penguins on Tuesday night at UBS Arena.
David Rittich made 20 saves while Clay Stevenson, 26, recalled from the AHL on Saturday and playing in his third NHL game, stopped 29 shots for the Capitals (28-22-7), who have won three in a row.
The Islanders had 23 attempts blocked and another 20 miss the net and never took advantage of the early rebounds.
“Could we have been better? Yes, absolutely,” coach Patrick Roy said. “But (Stevenson) made some great saves on some of them as well. We could have had more bodies to the net and picked up those rebounds.”
Leading goal scorer Bo Horvat, whose last goal was Dec. 30 since he missed nine games with a lower-body injury from Jan. 3-21, could not convert on a shorthanded breakaway at 11:34 of the first period and had Stevenson blocker aside another breakaway chance at 15:19 of the second period.
Stevenson also denied Casey Cizikas’ on an odd-man shorthanded rush at 2:35 of the third period off Horvat’s feed.
Defenseman Martin Fehervary tied it at 1-1 on the Capitals’ first shot of the second period at 5:29 after Mathew Barzal turned the puck over up ice. Ex-Islander Anthony Beauvillier, coming out from behind the crease, snuck it past a poorly-positioned Rittich at the right post for the winner at 6:00.
“I thought we had a really good first period until they scored those two quick goals,” Roy said. “For some reason, it affected us. Is it because we had a few good chances and we didn’t score on those? Maybe that affected us as well.”
“When you look at the game as a whole, it could have gone a different way, maybe,” said defenseman Scott Mayfield, who fought Tom Wilson at 1:47 of the third period after his hard, neutral-zone check on an unaware Simon Holmstrom. “Those games can go either way. In the end, it’s two points lost and it’s on to the next one.”
Roy reunited Horvat and Barzal, along with Palat, for the first time since their one-game reunion in a 3-2 shootout win in Chicago on Dec. 30. He also moved Jonathan Drouin to the middle in between Emil Heineman and Holmstrom.
But Horvat has now been stuck on 21 goals for seven games and Drouin scored his third goal 32 games ago.
Barzal’s unassisted goal off Wilson’s turnover opened the scoring at 16:38 of the first period. But Nic Dowd made it 3-1 at 8:46 of the third period as the puck deflected in off defenseman Tony DeAngelo’s skate and defenseman John Carlson added an empty-netter.
Notes & quotes: Roy said goalie Ilya Sorokin will start on Tuesday…Defenseman Adam Boqvist and Max Shabanov 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.