Islanders 5-4

Goals

1ST PERIOD

FLA     Purcell (1)    Hudler (1), Kulikov (1)

NYI     Nelson (1)     Strome (1)

FLA     Jokinen (1)    Campbell (1), Smith (1)          PPG

NYI     Nielsen (1)     Tavares (1), Leddy (1)               PPG

2ND PERIOD

FLA     Smith (1)        Petrovic (1), Jokinen (1)

NYI      Tavares (1)     Okposo (1), Neilson (1)

3RD PERIOD

NYI       Okposo (1)      Tavares (2)

NYI       Strome (1)       Quine (1), Hamonic (1)

FLA       Smith (2)         Jokinen (2), Bjugstad (1)

Shots  FLA 46  NYI 26

My  3 Stars: Greiss, Tavares, Smith

Effort: Offense: 10     Defense: 5         Overall: 7.5

 

We did the job offensively. But on defense we were awful. Roberto was not doing well and only came up with 1 big save. We could’ve buried a couple of juicy rebounds that Greiss left but we didn’t. The top line was buzzing but didn’t get anything done. We also did horrible on the key to the series which was shut down John Tavares. HE GOT 3 POINTS! Well he wasn’t matched up against Barkov much so that didn’t help. We got off to an early start when Kulikov dumped the puck to Hudler. On a 2 on 1 Hudler passed it to Purcell who buried it. About 5 minutes later, Hudler lost a battle and Brock Nelson found the puck. Nelson buried it past Luongo. Then on the Power play I forgot how Jokinen scored. I only remember bits of the 1st because I watched the 1st period last night and the 2nd and 3rd this morning. Tavares and Neilson got a 3 on 1 and Tavares just passed it to Neilson who scored a goal in which Lu probably could’ve saved. Smith scored on an empty net when Petro threw it off the boards and Smith grabbed the rebound and put it in the net. The turning point of the game was at the end of the 2nd. Somehow Tavares scored. Then he set up Okposo at the start of the 3rd. Strome scored on one where Lu let up a juicy rebound. Smith scored one from the end side on the top shelf. Jokinen slashed a guy with 3 minutes to go killing valuable comeback time. We were buzzing offensively but Greiss shut us down. Wilson got some big hits in. It was a physical game. Jagr got a little shaken up early on when he got tied up with someone and lost his footing and crashed in the boards. He lost another tooth he told George Richards of the Miami Herald. Anyway we have to bury some of these opportunities. Twice Greiss left the net wide open and was down and we could have buried it home. Well I expect a strong game tonight.

NYI lead 1-0