*Photo from RawCharge*
New York leads series 1-0
After John Tavares left the New York Islanders after the 2017-2018 season, forward Mathew Barzal had to step into a larger leadership role in the locker room, alongside captain Anders Lee. Entering their rematch with the Tampa Bay Lightning, Barzal stepped up. Barzal scored, Ryan Pulock scored, and the Islanders defeated the Lightning 2-1 on Sunday night.
After a slow start to the playoffs in the first round, Barzal has turned it up a notch since the second round began. He was instrumental in the Islanders eliminating the Boston Bruins in 6 games, with several important goals and assists, and he's off to a hot start in the 3rd round, when he scored, and was on the ice for Pulock's goal.
This is also a rematch of last year's eastern conference final in the playoff bubble, where the Lightning eliminated the Islanders in 6 games while on their way to winning the Stanley Cup, which included an 8-2 loss for the Islanders in game one.
Islanders coach Barry Trotz said "I thought today was more reminiscent of Game 2 and 3 and 4 and 5 and 6 from last season. I think teams are pretty well the same as they were last year. Systematically, we're pretty similar. There hasn't been any overhaul, I don't think, on both sides. Pretty well what we expected, and in some ways that was good. Being familiar with a team that you haven't played for 9 months, it was good."
The Islanders didn't start the scoring until 12:32 into the second period, when Barzal scored his 4th goal of the playoffs to give New York a 1-0 lead. They extended that lead to 2-0 when Pulock scored his 4th of the playoffs just 5:36 into the 3rd period. Pulock has now scored 4 playoff goals after scoring just two in 56 regular season games.
Pulock said of his recent offensive hot streak that "I tried not to let that bother me in the regular season and just keep playing my game, play the right way, play good defensively. I knew it would come, but obviously come playoff time, it's nice to contribute in that way and kind of help out offensively. Every goal is huge in the playoffs. It's nice to get one or two, just want to keep that going."
The Lightning tried to get back in the game, when Brayden Point scored on the power play with 54 seconds left to play, which cut the Islanders deficit to 2-1, but the Lightning couldn't score again in the remaining time. Andrei Vasilevskiy saved 29 of 31 shots for a .935 save percentage.
Lightning coach Jon Cooper said "Our work ethic was there, our compete was there, our minds weren't there. Some of our decisions were poor. That's what happens. You get this deep into the playoffs, there are only four teams left, you've got to have everything working in unison, and we just weren't quite there tonight."
Game two of the series is on Tuesday night, with the Islanders looking to win another road game to take a 2-0 series lead, and the Lightning are looking to tie the series up heading to New York.
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