*Photo from Lakeland Today*
Things are looking up on the Island right now. Simon Holmstrom scored, Bo Horvat had the game winning goal, and the New York Islanders defeated the Edmonton Oilers with a 3-1 victory on Tuesday night on Long Island.
After a rough start to the season, the Islanders are 7-1-2 in their last 10 games and have jumped into the playoff picture with a 15-8-8 record and a 3rd place spot in the Metropolitan Division. On Tuesday, it was 3 unanswered goals in the second period that put them over the top.
Islanders head coach Lane Lambert said "We had to move some people around, mixed the lines around on a consistent basis because of the fact that we weren't trying to tax people too much. All the forwards did a good job. I thought our defense played well, but I thought our forwards did a good job of trying to manage their ice time."
Starting the scoring was the Oilers. The only goal of the first period came from Leon Draisaitl, who put Edmonton up 1-0 on his 13th goal of the season, assisted by Mattias Ekholm and Warren Foegele. Anders Lee scored 2:39 into the second period to even the score, making it 1-1 on his 8th goal of the season.
On the power play at the 11:30 mark of the second, the Islanders struck again. It was Horvat who scored, putting them ahead 2-1 on his 13th goal of the season, with assists going to Noah Dobson and Brock Nelson. With the Islanders shorthanded later in the period, Holmstrom scored to make it a 3-1 game.
Horvat said of his goal that "You're just hoping that he finds you. You kind of feel like in that moment you have empty space, and you're just trying to find the hole, and Nelson made a heck of a play to get it over to me. I didn’t have much time at all anywhere out there. I felt the puck on my stick. I wanted to get it off as quick as possible, not only for the guys around me, but I didn’t want to allow the goaltender to get over. So thankfully it went in."
Getting the start for the Oilers was Ilya Sorokin, who played well to improve to 9-4-7 in 20 starts with a win. Sorokin stopped all but one of the 31 shots he faced from the Oilers, giving him a stellar .968 save percentage.
Starting for the Oilers across the ice was Stuart Skinner, who saw his record drop to 11-9-1 in 21 starts. Skinner turned aside 18 out of the 21 shots on goal the Islanders had, recording a .857 save percentage in the loss.
Oilers forward Derek Ryan said of the loss that "Special teams was the main culprit. I thought we played a little sloppy in the second, some turnovers in the neutral zone, and let the game get away from us a little bit there. But obviously, special teams were a major difference."
The Islanders finish a back to back when they face the Washington Capitals on Wednesday night, with Semyon Varlamov set to start. The Oilers travel to take on the New Jersey Devils on Thursday, with Calvin Pickard the likely starter.
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