New York Islanders Close Out Regular Season with Potentially Huge Loss

credit: Islanders.nhl.com

The New York Islanders closed out their regular season and regular season history at the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum last night.  They had everything to play for after the Washington Capitals were defeated by the Rangers hours earlier.

After an emotional pregame celebration of the building’s storied history, the Islanders came out and played a spirited game, but ultimately fell 5-4 to the Columbus Blue Jackets.

The Caps loss earlier in the day gave the Islanders a shot to host Washington in their playoff series this week should the Isles have come up with the win.

However, after perhaps the biggest win of the season at Pittsburgh on Friday, the Islanders looked as if they were going to make it two in a row and claim home ice.

The Jackets however, beat the Islanders in a very similar fashion to their last match-up last week.

Leading 4-3, the Islanders allowed a late goal to Scott Hartnell who scored for the 28th time this season.

Just like last week, the Islanders fell in the shootout and watched home ice advantage fly out the window.

The Islanders will instead travel to Washington this week for the playoff series.

The news is not all bad for New York though.

They should get some of their injured players back including Matt Martin, Frans Nielson, and defenseman Travis Hamonic.  They hope to have Mikhail Grabovski back as well who had been one of the Isles best players this season.

Also, the Islanders were a better road team than home team in 2014-15, so going to Washington shouldn’t phase them.

The Islanders haven’t won a playoff series since they surprised the Pittsburgh Penguins as an 8th seed in 1993 on David Volek’s famous overtime goal.

John Tavares scored his team-leading 38th goal of the year.