It wasn’t always pretty, but the Islanders’ special teams answered the call Friday night.
After being let down by both units in Game 1, the Islanders got important contributions from both in Game 2 to come up with a 5-2 win over the Capitals.
The Islanders did a better job of staying out of the box Friday — after giving up a pair of power-play goals in Game 1 — but still had to kill off two key penalties in the third period while protecting a 3-2 lead. They kept the Capitals out of the net and took the momentum the rest of the way to extend their series lead to 2-0.
“When you need a kill, you’re in a one-goal game and you got that [Capitals] power play that has so many weapons on it and can hurt you in so many ways, you need that big in those moments and our guys were big in that moment,” coach Barry Trotz said. “Sometimes you look at the numbers and percentages but when you need those kills, we got it done, in a real important time in the third period when the other team was pressing.”
The Islanders’ power play also got off the schneid. After going 0-for-3 in Game 1, they still struggled at times on the man advantage in Game 2 but got one big goal from Nick Leddy. The defenseman fired a shot from the point that got through on the Isles’ third power-play of the night to tie the game early in the second period.
The bad blood got left in the past.
Game 1 between the Islanders and Capitals was a physical affair that included some fireworks after Anders Lee delivered a crushing blow to Nicklas Backstrom. But there was little carryover into Game 2, aside from Tom Wilson darting around to deliver some hits in the first period. Wilson tallied eight hits in the first 20 minutes, but was quiet after that as the Islanders got back to business.
Trotz kept the same lineup for Game 2 that he rolled out in Game 1, which left Johnny Boychuk, Ross Johnston and Tom Kuhnhackl among the healthy scratches.
