{"id":555270,"date":"2026-04-18T13:15:48","date_gmt":"2026-04-18T13:15:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/555270\/"},"modified":"2026-04-18T13:15:48","modified_gmt":"2026-04-18T13:15:48","slug":"what-anders-lees-islanders-future-likely-comes-down-to","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/555270\/","title":{"rendered":"What Anders Lee’s Islanders future likely comes down to"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mathieu Darche gave a 263-word answer Wednesday when asked whether he still sees Anders Lee as the Islanders captain going forward.<\/p>\n

Lots of them were complimentary. The door certainly didn\u2019t close. There is a negotiation to be had<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But the Islanders general manager never used the word \u201cyes.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Newslanders\u2019 Anders Lee (27) looks to pass during the second period of an NHL hockey game against the Carolina Hurricanes AP<\/p>\n

\u201cI told Anders I\u2019d love to see him play his 1,000th game with the Islanders,\u201d Darche said. \u201cWhat that looks like, whether we were able to find something that\u2019s suitable for us and for him, we\u2019ll discuss. But I know he\u2019s not far from it.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d love to see that, but I\u2019m always looking forward to what other options we have. What do we need to do to help move this roster forward? But the way Anders played this year, I think he can still help us. The question is, do we get to an agreement that makes sense for him and for us?<\/p>\n

\u201cSo we agreed, obviously, there\u2019s meetings we have to go through. There\u2019s not gonna be anything imminent. We\u2019re gonna keep talking and see if there\u2019s anything there.\u201d<\/p>\n

In short: This might come down to how big of a hometown discount Lee is willing to give the Isles.<\/p>\n

\"HockeyAnders Lee #27 of the New York Islanders skates with the puck against Felix Unger Sorum #36 of the Carolina Hurricanes. NHLI via Getty Images<\/p>\n

We already know from Noah Dobson\u2019s negotiations<\/a> last year that once Darche sets a ceiling, he is unlikely to go over it. Lee, no matter where he signs, will almost certainly take a pay cut from his last deal, which ran seven years and averaged $7 million annually. Entering the offseason at age 35, two or three years feels likely, with the AAV likely depending in large part on the contract\u2019s length.<\/p>\n

Lee expressed Tuesday morning that his wish is to remain an Islander. But of course, the captain did not get into what number he\u2019d be willing to accept with reporters.<\/p>\n

If he is not on Long Island next season, it would represent a sea change in the makeup of the dressing room. Aside from the COVID-shortened 2021 year in which he tore his ACL, Lee has played at least 68 games for the Islanders in every season since 2014-15, and been their captain since 2018-19.<\/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

Watching him play his 1,000th game \u2014 he finished this season at 922, so if he stays healthy, that milestone would come next season \u2014 with any other team would, at a minimum, feel supremely odd.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese are hard things to talk about because you don\u2019t know,\u201d said Ryan Pulock, who\u2019s been Lee\u2019s teammate for his entire NHL career. \u201cAnd obviously when your contract is expired, you never know what could happen. I think he\u2019s such a staple here. Such a key part of the success that we\u2019ve had.<\/p>\n

\u201cA leader, a protector of all the guys in here. I think he\u2019s really kinda done it all. Proud to have been his teammate, and hopefully for longer. But you don\u2019t know. But I think what he\u2019s done for this franchise, for the Island, he\u2019s laid it all out there every single night. It\u2019s been an honor to play with him.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mathieu Darche gave a 263-word answer Wednesday when asked whether he still sees Anders Lee as the Islanders…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":555271,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5110],"tags":[8493,5,122,3328,159,5190,5189,4,550,43],"class_list":{"0":"post-555270","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-hockey","10":"tag-islanders","11":"tag-new-york","12":"tag-new-york-islanders","13":"tag-newyork","14":"tag-newyorkislanders","15":"tag-nhl","16":"tag-nhl-free-agency","17":"tag-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116425903146158698","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/555270","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=555270"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/555270\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/555271"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=555270"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=555270"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=555270"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}