{"id":492908,"date":"2026-03-08T09:13:24","date_gmt":"2026-03-08T09:13:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/492908\/"},"modified":"2026-03-08T09:13:24","modified_gmt":"2026-03-08T09:13:24","slug":"islanders-jean-gabriel-pageau-glad-to-stay-at-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/492908\/","title":{"rendered":"Islanders’ Jean-Gabriel Pageau glad to stay at ‘home’"},"content":{"rendered":"

SAN JOSE, Calif. \u2014 Jean-Gabriel Pageau said he never had an expectation that Mathieu Darche would want to talk extension in the middle of the season, especially after Darche had made clear that wasn\u2019t likely when the year started.<\/p>\n

Pageau was thrilled to do so, though, and ecstatic to secure the next three years of his future on Long Island with a contract that will pay him $4.85 million annually, which came together over the last week.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you have kids, family, you don\u2019t really know where you\u2019re gonna be the next day, it was kind of a relief just to know we\u2019re gonna stay,\u201d Pageau said before the Islanders\u2019 2-1 overtime win over the Sharks<\/a> on Saturday night. \u201cExtremely happy with the result. That\u2019s where we wanted to be. We wanted to keep going on our mission. Make the playoffs and go from there.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Jean-GabrielJean-Gabriel Pageau (44) skates the puck up ice as Michael Misa (77) forechecks during the Islanders\u2019 2-1 overtime win over the Sharks on March 7, 2026 in San Jose, Calif. Robert Edwards-Imagn Images<\/p>\n

Ottawa native Pageau played for his hometown Senators for the first eight years of his career before being traded to the Islanders in February 2020. Now, though, it\u2019s Long Island that, he said Saturday, \u201cfeels like home.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe love everything,\u201d he said. \u201cNot only the teammates, the organization, but the fans. The support they give us day in, day out on a bad night or a good night. They\u2019re there to support us. I feel the people are just genuine. They\u2019re always nice to be around, nice to us. It makes us want to stick around.\u201d<\/p>\n

Neither he nor Brayden Schenn \u2014 acquired at Friday\u2019s trade deadline \u2014 have any concerns either about their similar skill sets being redundant.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat I know about his game is when you\u2019re playing him on a night, you\u2019re not gonna get an easy night,\u201d Schenn said. \u201cHe\u2019s strong in the faceoff dot, he plays hard defense, he\u2019s all over you.\u201d<\/p>\n

The only forward line that remained intact from Thursday night was Pageau\u2019s with Anders Lee and Simon Holmstrom.<\/p>\n

Emil Heineman moved to the top line with Bo Horvat centering him and Mathew Barzal. Cal Ritchie shifted to wing on the second line, with Schenn at center and Ondrej Palat on the opposite wing. <\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\tOn the ice from Long Island\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSign up for Inside the Islanders by Ethan Sears, a weekly Sports+ exclusive.\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\tThank you\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

Anthony Duclair came back into the lineup to play on the fourth line to the left side of Casey Cizikas and Marc Gatcomb, while Kyle MacLean drew out as a healthy scratch.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not too different,\u201d Ritchie said of playing wing. \u201cI think, obviously, if you\u2019re first back in the D-zone, you\u2019re still the low guy and things like that. For me that doesn\u2019t change too much of my game, to be honest. That just means less faceoffs and [Schenn\u2019s] one of the best faceoff guys in the league.\u201d<\/p>\n

Holmstrom switched to No. 92 to accommodate Schenn, who kept the No. 10 he\u2019s worn his entire career.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt cost me a little bit,\u201d Schenn said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN JOSE, Calif. \u2014 Jean-Gabriel Pageau said he never had an expectation that Mathieu Darche would want to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":492909,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5110],"tags":[5,122,8563,3328,159,5190,5189,4,43],"class_list":{"0":"post-492908","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-islanders","8":"tag-hockey","9":"tag-islanders","10":"tag-jean-gabriel-pageau","11":"tag-new-york","12":"tag-new-york-islanders","13":"tag-newyork","14":"tag-newyorkislanders","15":"tag-nhl","16":"tag-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116192792443752389","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/492908","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=492908"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/492908\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/492909"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=492908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=492908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=492908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}