The Islanders reached the three-week Olympic break on a two-game winning streak after Thursday night’s 3-1 win over the Devils at Prudential Center.
That left them in third place in the Metropolitan Division with a 32-21-5 mark, one point behind the second-place Penguins, who have played two fewer games, and four points ahead of the Blue Jackets, who have won seven straight under newly-hired coach Rick Bowness and also played two fewer games, and the Capitals, who have played one more game.
The season resumes on Feb. 26 in Montreal, though the team — minus Bo Horvat (Team Canada) and linemate Ondrej Palat (Team Czechia), who will be in Milan, Italy for the Winter Olympics — can start practicing again on Feb. 17, though they’ll likely wait a day or two after that to get back on the ice.
Here are three takeaways heading into the Olympic break:
1. The Islanders can’t count on a wild-card spot
The Islanders must be vigilant about remaining in one of the Metropolitan Division’s three guaranteed playoff spots since there’s a decent chance the Atlantic Division could scoop up both of the wild-card spots and send five teams to the postseason.
The Sabres, with one point more than the Islanders 69 in one fewer game, hold the Eastern Conference’s first wild-card spot while the Bruins, with 69 points in two fewer games than the Islanders, are in the second position.
The Islanders still face the Blue Jackets twice more, including on Feb. 28 in Columbus, Ohio.
Not that the Islanders are shying from the difficult playoff push with 24 games remaining.
“I feel great,” defenseman Adam Pelech said. “I feel like we’ve been getting better and better. Confidence is high. I think everyone is feeling good.”
The Islanders have gotten to this point with top-six wing Kyle Palmieri (left knee) and defenseman Alexander Romanov (right shoulder) done for the season and Horvat, their leading goal scorer with 24, missing a combined 14 games with two separate lower-body injuries from Dec. 13-Jan. 21.
“It says a lot about our group, it says a lot about character,” Horvat said. “Our will in here. We’re playing some pretty good hockey right now. We can even keep getting better.”
Which leads us to…
2. GM Mathieu Darche can’t be done dealing
The first-year general manager, who has acted like a seasoned veteran from Day 1, struck quickly to acquire defenseman Carson Soucy from the Rangers and Palat from the Devils last week.
There’s a roster freeze in effect for the Olympic break through Feb. 22 and the NHL trade deadline is March 6. Despite being able to insert Palat onto Horvat’s top line, Darche will likely still be looking for help up front with both Anthony Duclair and Max Shabanov, who were supposed to be top-six options but were both healthy scratches on Thursday, struggling.
He’ll also strongly consider retaining pending unrestricted free agents Anders Lee and Jean-Gabriel Pageau even without new deals in place, considering them his own trade rental options.
3. The Islanders are kings of the Metropolitan area
Thursday’s victory completed a four-game season sweep of the Devils by an aggregate score of 17-4 after they swept the four-game season series from the Rangers by a combined 14-3. Cynically, that’s 25% of their wins and 18.3% of their goals against two bad, non-playoff teams.
But the bigger picture is that dominance and the emergence of rookie defenseman Matthew Schaefer has left the Islanders setting the bar among the local teams. It’s the first time the Islanders swept both their local rivals in the same season.
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.