The 2010-2011 Season for the New York Islanders has come to a disappointing end, with the club failing to make the playoffs for the 4th straight season. The season started off very promising for the club after going 5-1-1 through the first 8 games, at the time they were tied with the Penguins for top spot in the Atlantic Division. The 2 OT losses were a 5-4 Shootout loss to Dallas OPening Night and a 3-2 Overtime Loss in Pittsburgh. the one regulation loss was a 2-1 loss in Washington to the Capitals. That loss in Washington had some significance to it, as the lone Islanders goal was the 1st NHL goal for Nino Niederreiter, who only played 9 games all season registering a goal and an assist. After a 2-1 Overtime win in Tampa Bay against the Lightning, The Islanders would go on a awful 17 game winless streak that, for all intensive purposes, sunk their season. During that 17 game winless streak, there was one major milestone hit. On October 23rd in a 4-3 loss in Florida to the Panthers, John Tavares scored his 1st Careeer Hat Trick.
After a ten-game losing streak, the Islanders changed coaches on November 15, moving Scott Gordon into an adviser to the General Manager position and naming the Bridgeport Sound Tigers head coach, Jack Capuano, as their interim head coach.[10] The Islanders ended a near franchise tying record of 15 straight games without a win on November 26 against the New Jersey Devils. The Islanders won 2-0 with Rick DiPietro securing the shutout. The Islanders ended the season with the worst average attendance in the NHL with an average of 11,059 (68.1% full). As of writing time, Jack Capuano has been named head coach for next season, getting the interim tag removed from his name.
The Islanders had a flare for the dramatic during the season, espically in Overtime. The Islanders won 7 games in Overtime this year. The Ot victories were as follows: Oct 18th in Toronto (Tavares), October 21st in Tampa Bay (Moulson), December 22nd at home against Tampa Bay (Tavares), December 31st in Detroit ( Parenteau), January 8th in Colorado (Tavares), Febuary 18th in Buffalo (Grabner), and March 8th at home against Toronto (Comeau).
Besides the flare for the dramatic in Overtime, and also the shootout, the Islanders had plenty of memorable games this season as well. The first had to be on Columbus Day October 13th, a 6-4 victory over the rival New York Rangers. The last 2 games of calander year 2010 were very good to the Islanders, as on December 29th the team played the Pittsburgh Penguins at home. Islanders won in a shootout 2-1 and at the same time snapped Sidney Crosby's point streak which heading into the contest had been 25 games. Then 2 nights later on New Years Eve the Isles went into Joe Louis Arena in Detroit and walked away with a thrilling OT victory over the Red Wings on the PA Parenteau. Two more games of note happen to come against the Buffalo Sabres. First was the game betweent he two at Nassau Coliseum on January 15th, a game in which the Islanders won 5-3. What was so memorable about that one was the natural hat trick scored by John Tavares in a span of 3:25 the 2nd fastest Islanders natural hat trick in team history. The other one was the game on February 13th at HSBC Arena in Buffalo which the Islanders won in OT 7-6. What was so great about that game was the 2 teams traded hat tricks. Drew Stafford scored one for Buffalo, but not to be outdone, Michael Grabner scored on for the Islanders, the 3rd being the OT Game Winner. The final really memorable game of the year was the 9-3 win over the Penguins on Friday February 11th at Nassau Coliseum. This game was memorable for not only the score but for the fights, as this game turned into a slugfest with 65 penalties, 10 ejections, 15 fighting majors, 20 misconducts, and 346 total minutes in penalties. And this was all in response to what happened 2 weeks prior in Pittsburgh with Rick DiPetrio getting knocked out by Brent Johnson of the Penguins in 1 punch.
Here are the final stat totals for the players from this season:
#
91 John Tavares 79 29 38 67 -16 53
15 P. A. Parenteau 81 20 33 53 -8 46
26 Matt Moulson 82 31 22 53 -10 24
40 Michael Grabner 76 34 18 52 13 10
57 Blake Comeau 77 24 22 46 -17 43
51 Frans Nielsen 71 13 31 44 13 38
12 Josh Bailey 70 11 17 28 -13 37
47 Andrew MacDonald 60 4 23 27 9 37
36 Travis Hamonic 62 5 21 26 4 103
38 Jack Hillen 64 4 18 22 -5 45
44 Rob Schremp‡ 45 10 12 22 -19 12
20 James Wisniewski‡ 32 3 18 21 -18 18
21 Kyle Okposo 38 5 15 20 3 40
27 Milan Jurcina 46 4 13 17 -4 30
24 Radek Martinek 64 3 13 16 -5 35
17 Matt Martin 68 5 9 14 -13 147
93 Doug Weight 18 2 7 9 -3 10
28 Zenon Konopka 82 2 7 9 -14 307
58 Jesse Joensuu 42 6 3 9 -6 33
8 Bruno Gervais 53 0 6 6 -14 30
42 Dylan Reese 27 0 6 6 -12 15
6 Ty Wishart 20 1 4 5 5 10
16 Jon Sim 34 1 3 4 -10 22
7 Trent Hunter 17 1 3 4 -3 23
10 Mike Mottau 20 0 3 3 -12 8
4 Mark Eaton 34 0 3 3 -2 8
37 Jeremy Colliton 15 2 1 3 -7 10
59 Micheal Haley 27 2 1 3 -4 85
25 Nino Niederreiter 9 1 1 2 -1 8
14 Trevor Gillies 39 2 0 2 -3 165
81 Justin DiBenedetto 8 0 1 1 -2 2
71 Mark Katic 11 0 1 1 -9 4
Goaltenders
# Player GP TOI W L OT GA GAA SA Sv% SO G A PIM
39 Rick DiPietro 26 1533 8 14 4 88 3.44 773 .886 1 0 1 25
30 Dwayne Roloson‡ 20 1206 6 13 1 53 2.64 629 .916 0 0 1 2
35 Al Montoya 21 1154 9 5 5 46 2.39 585 .921 1 0 1 2
60 Kevin Poulin 10 491 4 2 1 20 2.44 262 .924 0 0 0 0
52 Nathan Lawson 10 384 1 4 2 26 4.06 243 .893 0 0 0 0
1 Mikko Koskinen 4 208 2 1 0 15 4.33 118 .873 0 0 0 0
Now having said what has been so far, I think it was an OK year for the team despite finishing with a 30-39-13 record. Now things would have been completly different, I feel, had the team been able to stay healthy, as they had the most man games lossed due to injury in the league. Think about this for a moment. Okposo missed a little more than half the year, Weight and Hunter played under 20 games each this year, Streit missed the entire year, and the team used 6 different goalies to protect the nets. Just imagine how much better this hockey club could have been with everybody healthy and in the lineup. All Islanders fans really have good things to look forward to for next season with what is currently in place.
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