Welcome to Buckeye State Hockey’s Metropolitan Division preview for this upcoming season! Through the next week or so, each Buckeye State Hockey writer will analyze a divisional opponent, focusing on strengths and weaknesses. We’ll also be having some comments from bloggers specific to those teams discussing off-season moves or forecasts for the upcoming season. Also, we’ll be throwing down a divisional preview piece following the individual team previews, along with the BS Hockey Staff Predictions for the final division standings.
The first team we’ll look at is the New York Islanders. They had a miserable 2013/14 season but a plethora of off-season acquisitions have hopes high on Long Island, as the franchise plays out it’s final season at the Nassau Coliseum.
2014/2015 Schedule vs the Blue Jackets:
Game 1 [CBJ game 40]: Sat Jan 10, Nationwide Arena
Game 2 [CBJ game 54]: Sat Feb 14, @ Nassau Coliseum
Game 3 [CBJ game 77]: Thu Apr 02, Nationwide Arena
Game 4 [CBJ game 82]: Sat Apr 11, @ Nassau Coliseum
2013/2014 Results vs the Blue Jackets:
Game 1: Sat Oct 05, Nationwide Arena: CBJ 3 – 2 NYI, SO
Game 2: Sat Nov 29, @ Nassau Coliseum: CBJ 5 – 2 NYI
Game 3: Sun Mar 23, Nationwide Arena: CBJ 0 – 2 NYI
Game 4: Sun Apr 06, @ Nassau Coliseum, CBJ 4 – 0 NYI
The Jackets/Islanders series was hardly a barnburner last season, as there was no real rivarly between the two clubs in their first year as divisional foes. It also didn’t help that the Islanders were more worried about not being a tire fire of a team for most of the season. The Jackets took the series 3-1-0, a trend which will hopefully continue despite all of the Islanders off-season improvements.
The key match-ups in the 2014/15 season series are the last two: late-season matches between two teams likely fighting for play-off spots in a tight division. They could be very intriguing games, and if the teams are close in the standings, a couple of heated match-ups it would certainly go a long way to fostering a potential divisional rivalry.
ANALYSIS
The Isles were sunk by a few things last season: atrocious goaltending, a top defender who was essentially a pylon for opposing forwards, an unproven defensive corps, Thomas Vanek not exploding with John Tavares, and the season-ending injury suffered by Tavares during the Olympics. That’s a lot of issues. There were some silver linings in all of the crap clouds though: the rise of players like Brock Nelson [14 goals and 26 points in 72 games, a 53.4% Corsi For, and a +4.56% Corsi Relative to Teammates], Anders Lee [9g and 14pts in 22gp, 54% CF, +5.07% CorsiRel] and the fact that the team kept it’s head above water in the possession department for most of the season – even moreso after the departure of a “key” piece of their blueline. There were certainly signs that the team was maybe playing a bit under their actual skill level, and general manager Garth Snow appeared to understand this in the off-season, addressing the weak points of his team while heavily bolstering the squad’s depth. Anything that the Islanders could improve on, they did, and that’s bad news for the rest of the Metropolitan Division.
After posting a league worst team save percentage of 89.4% in 13/14, Snow went out and grabbed Jaroslav Halak for a tidy $4.5 million. Not content to just fix his starting slot, the Isles also acquired a very solid back-up in Chad Johnson. In this piece at Lighthouse Hockey, Chris McNally goes a bit more in-depth on the goaltending woes and just how much these two should help stem the bleeding. The money quote? “Last season, the duo of Halak and Johnson allowed 86 fewer goals than the Islanders as a team last year [163 to 249], in only 3 fewer games played [79 to 82].” That is quite the striking difference. Granted, Halak and Johnson both predominantly played for teams that suppressed shots a bit more than the Islanders [although not significantly], so maybe it’s unreasonable to expect that kind of insane improvement. But even if you up the Isles’ team save percentage from 89.4% to the NHL median save rate of 91.3%, not a farfetched plan with Halak and Johnson minding the pipes, the squad saves about 46 goals over the course of the season. That, coupled with a moderate increase in scoring, would most likely result in a play-off berth for Long Island.
Next – defensive concerns. First and foremost: Andrew MacDonald won’t be back, and that’s good for the Islanders. Much sought after at the trade deadline, MacDonald ended up dealt to Metro “rivals” Philadelphia. A double whammy of positive for the Isles: get rid of a guy who was eaten alive by opponents, AND let him go make a divisional opponent’s blueline worse! MacDonald’s statistical shortcomings have been well-covered, but Justin Bourne took a look at the Isles’ defensive woes – specifically how poor gap-control and bad reads [led by MacDonald, of course] were not helping their brutal goaltending. By ridding themselves of AMac, the Isles have already turned the corner, but they’re also hoping that another year of seasoning for blueline standouts Travis Hamonic, Cal de Haan, and Thomas Hickey, and a full season of health from veteran Lubo Visnovsky will provide some better adjustments against attacking players.
Up front, John Tavares should be back in full health, which in itself should mean an additional few points in the standings. Additionally, the team brought in noted “Lone Wolf” Mikhail Grabovski, along with his trusty sidekick Nikolai Kulemin. Their “maybe a bit too much” contracts aside, these two, along with Clarke MacArthur, formed one of the better lines in hockey for a couple of seasons before the Randy Carlyle Effect ruined their show. Grabovski was terribly used in his one full season under Randy Carlyle, being buried in the defensive zone, asked to shut down the top competition nightly, and then lambasted by his coach, the media and then the fans for also not being a top point producer. Grabovski was bought out by the Leafs, but managed to have a solid campaign with Washington in 2013/14, scoring 13 goals and 35 points in 58 games. Kulemin was in the same boat, but also had to be anchored to Jay McClement and David Clarkson throughout most of 2013/14, leading to another poor offensive season. Kulemin is getting further removed from his 30-goal season in 2010/11, and at 28 shouldn’t be expected to burst out with another. But, if he can have a similar bounceback now that he’s likely to be given more offensive minutes, the Islanders will have a very strong second line, and one of the deeper forward corps in the league.
The Islanders are going to be a team to watch: young, exciting hockey with a bunch of greenhorns looking to make good on heavy investments made to the squad in the off-season. They have all the pieces in place up front with two solid scoring lines and the makings of one of the better two-way third lines in the NHL with Josh Bailey, Frans Neilsen and Michael Grabner. Their fourth line could contain as many as seven rotating bodies, most of whom are not simple plugs. Their defence is still potentially the weak point, but there are six guys battling for spots five through seven on the depth chart, so the competition for the spot should be fierce, and the margin for error small. If you need to watch a game or two from a random team this season, you could do worse than the Islanders.
BUCKEYE STATE HOCKEY STAFF PREDICTION
5th in the division, battling for the final play-off spot in the conference.
PROJECTED LINES
Brock Nelson …… John Tavares ……… Kyle Okposo
Nikolai Kulemin . Mikhail Grabovski . Ryan Strome
Josh Bailey ………. Frans Neilsen …….. Michael Grabner
Matt Martin ……… Casey Czikas ……… Cal Clutterbuck
In the mix: Cory Conacher, Anders Lee, Colin McDonald, Eric Boulton.
Travis Hamonic .. Calvin de Haan
Lubo Visnovsky .. Thomas Hickey
TJ Brennan ……… Matt Donovan
In the mix: Matt Carkner, Brian Strait, Griffin Reinhart, Aaron Ness.
Jaroslav Halak …. Chad Johnson
In the mix: David Leggio, Kevin Poulin
READ MORE ABOUT THE ISLANDERS:
Lighthouse Hockey
@LHHockey
@garik16
@thechrismcnally
@jtbourne
– Jeremy
Follow me on twitter, @307x
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