{"id":201500,"date":"2025-09-20T12:59:31","date_gmt":"2025-09-20T12:59:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/201500\/"},"modified":"2025-09-20T12:59:31","modified_gmt":"2025-09-20T12:59:31","slug":"mat-barzals-islanders-transition-back-to-center-like-riding-a-bike-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/201500\/","title":{"rendered":"Mat Barzal\u2019s Islanders transition back to center \u2018like riding a bike\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

At least until prospect Calum Ritchie is ready to make the leap to the NHL, the Islanders\u2019 lineup vision hinges largely on shifting Mat Barzal back to center, where, if all goes according to plan, he will play regularly this season for the first time since the club traded for Bo Horvat at the 2023 All-Star break.<\/p>\n

After Barzal invested time and energy into learning how to play on Horvat\u2019s wing, going back to the middle \u2014 combined with knocking off the rust after a kneecap injury ended his season in February, later requiring surgery \u2014 is expected to be a process.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI think it\u2019s going to take a bit of time, but that\u2019s what we have. We have time,\u201d coach Patrick Roy said Friday. \u201cWe\u2019ll see how it goes and right now, I think it\u2019s going to be some adjustments he\u2019s going to have to make.\u201d<\/p>\n

Barzal looked good at the position Friday during the Islanders\u2019 intrasquad scrimmage, when he centered Anders Lee and Kyle Palmieri, and he sounded a positive note afterward.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like I\u2019ve played it my whole life,\u201d he said. \u201cSo, it\u2019s like riding a bike a little bit.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Mat<\/p>\n

Mat Barzal is transition back to center for the Islanders. NHLI via Getty Images<\/p>\n

One potential snag is that Barzal has always struggled in the faceoff circle, winning just 42.3 percent of his career faceoffs, with an abysmal 35.6 percent rate in 2022-23 when he last played in the middle regularly.<\/p>\n

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The Islanders were the league\u2019s best faceoff team last year at 54.9 percent.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s going to work with [assistant coach Benoit Desrosiers] and he\u2019s got [some] of the best centermen at faceoffs in [J-G] Pageau and Horvat,\u201d Roy said. \u201cSo he\u2019s going to have plenty of time to work with and it\u2019s just a bit of commitment from him wanting to do it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Earlier this week, Barzal made a point of saying he hopes he still can get some minutes with Horvat, even if the two are primarily split up, since they\u2019ve built strong chemistry together.<\/p>\n

Assuming he starts the year at center, though, the chances for that would likely come primarily at the end of games if the Islanders are pushing for a goal.<\/p>\n

Barzal did not hold back in assessing No. 1 pick Matthew Schaefer.<\/p>\n

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\u201cHe\u2019s going to be one of, if not the best, defenseman in the league, I think, at some point,\u201d Barzal said. \u201cBased off his instincts right now, he\u2019s got it.\u201d<\/p>\n

MSG announced its broadcast schedule for the Islanderson Friday, with the family of networks set to televise 72 regular-season and four preseason games this season.<\/p>\n

Brendan Burke will be doing play-by-play with Butch Goring and Thomas Hickey as analysts, while Shannon Hogan and Cal Clutterbuck will be on the pre- and postgame.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"At least until prospect Calum Ritchie is ready to make the leap to the NHL, the Islanders\u2019 lineup…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":201501,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5110],"tags":[8493,7622,3669,4532,5,122,776,3328,159,5190,5189,4,2905,4937],"class_list":{"0":"post-201500","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-islanders","8":"tag-anders-lee","9":"tag-barzal","10":"tag-bo-horvat","11":"tag-calum-ritchie","12":"tag-hockey","13":"tag-islanders","14":"tag-kyle-palmieri","15":"tag-new-york","16":"tag-new-york-islanders","17":"tag-newyork","18":"tag-newyorkislanders","19":"tag-nhl","20":"tag-patrick-roy","21":"tag-the-islanders"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/115236750403228008","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201500","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=201500"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201500\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/201501"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=201500"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=201500"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=201500"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}