Islanders Depth Tested

Depth on a hockey team, or any pro sports team for that matter, is so important. Deeper teams usually do well come playoff time. That depth gets tested when a star player goes down. It gets tested even further when that star player is your team captain. That's what the New York Islanders now have to deal with. Last night in a 5-3 win over the New Jersey Devils, the Islanders seventh win in a row, Lee was injured in the first period. It came with about 7:11 left in the opening period after running into Devils forward Pavel Zacha. It was announced this morning as a lower body injury and no timetable for his return.

You hate to see it happen to a guy like Lee, who is the leader of this Islanders team and a heart and soul kind of player. He's played in 295 straight games and missed a total of three games in the past six seasons. Lee had 19 points and lead the Islanders with 12 goals by the time the play happened last night./

Its a killer losing Lee for two reasons. He is the team captain and not having his presence is going to be huge. They going to need somebody to step up in the leadership department. Then there's the scoring aspect. He's not only got a team leading 12 goals, but he reminds me a lot of Clark Gillies in that he's a very hard man to move from in front of the net when he places himself there.

Now what do you do to fill that lineup spot?

Lee had been playing on the left side with Barzal and Eberle. Now they need to shuffle things around to see who's going to be the right fit to play with them. First thought would be either Josh Bailey, who I've never been sold on but he has played better as of late, or Anthony Beauvillier. So to fill in his spot in the lineup, common sense would call for either Michael Dal Cole, or Keffer Bellows. Both guys are going to need to get playing time at this level if their skills are ever truly going to shine. There even a chance that Leo Komorov is going to get more ice time as well with this injury now.

It's good if your the Islanders to have this kind of option available to you to use, but it going to be up to the players to step up and to the coaching staff to get the right mix of players together to keep the Islanders lineup moving.