When this seemingly interminable hockey season finally ends – rumor has it that it eventually will – look no further for a Stanley Cup sleeper than the New York Islanders.
I’ll wait until you are done laughing.
Lets all hop into the DeLaurian and take a trip back in time to June of 2006. Isles owner Charles Wang announced the hiring of Neil Smith as GM and former Sabres coach Ted Nolan as head coach. He also announced that Pat LaFontaine would return to the Islanders as Senior Advisor to the Owner. A little over a month later, citing ‘philosophical differences’, Wang surprisingly fired Smith and replaced him with Islanders back up Goaltender Garth Snow. Later that same day, LaFontaine resigned his Senior Advisor post. Then in September, the Islanders announced that they had signed goaltender Rick DiPietro to a 15-year, 67.5 million dollar contract, among the longest in professional sports history.
Obviously, this bizarre series of events left even the most abstact thinking sports fan befuddled and believing that every one on the island had lost their hockey minds.
Fast forward to the present day. DiPietro has firmly established himself in the upper echelon of NHL Goaltenders. DiPietro currently sits in the top ten in Games Started, Minutes Played, Wins, Save Percentage and Shutouts and at age 25, promises to be years away from reaching his prime. Nolan’s abilities as bench boss we never the question, but for whatever reasons, be it fact or rumor, he is back coaching after a 10 year hiatus and has re-established himself as a darkhorse candidate for coach of the year, leading a team that, with the shocking trade day deadline acquisition of power forward Ryan Smyth, looks to be surprisingly deep and balanced.
The mark of a team poised to make an extended play off run is its performance down the stretch. In a conference where 6 teams, separated by just 5 points, are battling for the final 2 play off spots, the Isles are playing superior hockey, with just 1 regulation loss in their last 10 games, 7 of them wins.
Does this mean that Long Islanders should be prepared to raise a 5th Stanley Cup banner come May? Maybe. But one thing is certain, the laughter has definitely died down.
Gotta go, ‘ER’ is on.
I’ll wait until you are done laughing.
Lets all hop into the DeLaurian and take a trip back in time to June of 2006. Isles owner Charles Wang announced the hiring of Neil Smith as GM and former Sabres coach Ted Nolan as head coach. He also announced that Pat LaFontaine would return to the Islanders as Senior Advisor to the Owner. A little over a month later, citing ‘philosophical differences’, Wang surprisingly fired Smith and replaced him with Islanders back up Goaltender Garth Snow. Later that same day, LaFontaine resigned his Senior Advisor post. Then in September, the Islanders announced that they had signed goaltender Rick DiPietro to a 15-year, 67.5 million dollar contract, among the longest in professional sports history.
Obviously, this bizarre series of events left even the most abstact thinking sports fan befuddled and believing that every one on the island had lost their hockey minds.
Fast forward to the present day. DiPietro has firmly established himself in the upper echelon of NHL Goaltenders. DiPietro currently sits in the top ten in Games Started, Minutes Played, Wins, Save Percentage and Shutouts and at age 25, promises to be years away from reaching his prime. Nolan’s abilities as bench boss we never the question, but for whatever reasons, be it fact or rumor, he is back coaching after a 10 year hiatus and has re-established himself as a darkhorse candidate for coach of the year, leading a team that, with the shocking trade day deadline acquisition of power forward Ryan Smyth, looks to be surprisingly deep and balanced.
The mark of a team poised to make an extended play off run is its performance down the stretch. In a conference where 6 teams, separated by just 5 points, are battling for the final 2 play off spots, the Isles are playing superior hockey, with just 1 regulation loss in their last 10 games, 7 of them wins.
Does this mean that Long Islanders should be prepared to raise a 5th Stanley Cup banner come May? Maybe. But one thing is certain, the laughter has definitely died down.
Gotta go, ‘ER’ is on.
posted by average john at 5:01 PM
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