Isles 2
Thrashers 2D+>
ATLANTA – They knew it was going to be tough. Yet, judging by the way they forced passes through the middle and fell apart in their own end last night, the Islanders appear to have taken their revved-up opponents a little lightly. Some of the night’s biggest collisions occurred when the Isles skated into each other.
In what was decidedly their sloppiest outing of the young season, the Isles wrapped up a three-game trip with last night’s 2-2 tie with the Thrashers, who have not lost a game this year.
As for the Islanders, they squandered five power-play chances, made too many bad decisions with the puck and looked like a shell of the team that dominated the Sabres Saturday night. So was it a bad tie?
“No,” Steve Stirling said. “A point’s better than none. Would we have liked to have two? Should we have had two? Probably. But you take a point any way you can get them.”
The Islanders got their point the sloppy way last night, showing far less cohesiveness in their own end, displaying outright neglect for the off-sides rule and allowing the 2-1 advantage they held after 40 minutes to vanish into thin air.
Mark Parrish scored on a tip from the left post just 35 seconds into it, giving the Isles as early a lead as you could want – but the early lead was not enough to hold off a hungry and determined opponent.
So while Rick DiPietro had his teammates to thank for Saturday’s shutout, last night it was his teammates that had their goalie to thank for securing the tie with 21 saves, four in overtime. None was bigger than the stop he made on Fran Kaberle’s breakaway in OT.
“I think Atlanta just came out with more fire,” DiPietro said of coughing up a lead. “They came out skating in the second and third and put pressure on us. It’s one of those things: They’re in their home barn, they came out with a little more intensity, and I’m sure their coach didn’t like the way they played in the first.”
Eric Cairns got a right-point slap through Jason Blake’s screen and under Atlanta goalie Pasi Nurminen’s left pad for a 2-1 lead midway through the second period, before Marc Savard tied it at 6:18 of the third. Cairns’ goal was the first by an Islanders defenseman this season and his first since Jan. 11, when he also potted one against Atlanta.