Islanders takeaways from the first 10 games of the season: Scoring, depth and special teams concerns

BUFFALO — Well, this is the exact opposite of all that training camp talk about striving for a fast start to the season.

The Islanders (3-5-2) will carry a three-game losing streak into Friday night’s game against the Sabres as they continue a three-game road swing that opened with a 2-0 loss to the Blue Jackets on Wednesday night. It marked the fourth time they have been shut out.

Here are three takeaways from the Islanders’ first 10 games in Patrick Roy’s first full season as coach:

1. It might not just be a slow start.

After scoring only one goal in their last eight periods, the Islanders are clinging to the mantra that as long as the chances are coming, there’s no need to panic. And the chances are coming. Their total attempts advantage in Tuesday’s 3-1 loss to the Ducks was 90-51, and the Islanders were fourth in the NHL with an average of 32.3 shots per game entering Thursday’s play.

“We can’t [be frustrated],” Roy said after the latest loss. “We need to continue to play the right way. We need to continue to do good things. It will pay off eventually. We’re playing well defensively. We possess the puck.”

Yet there has to be a nagging fear that this might be a worst-case scenario for the Islanders. President/general managerLou Lamoriello has shown tremendous faith in his core group of players. There still are eight players on the current 23-man roster who were Islanders when Lamoriello and coach Barry Trotz took over in 2018, and that’s a lifetime in the NHL. Teams do suddenly grow old together and it looks bad. Witness the post-1964 Yankees and the latter years of Larry Bird/Robert Parish/Kevin McHale with the Celtics in the 1990s.

2. The depth has been exposed.

The Islanders made it through training camp unscathed and goalie Ilya Sorokin — one of the real positives so far — was even ready to start the season after offseason back surgery.

But key free-agent acquisition Anthony Duclair went down in the fifth game with a lower-body injury that will keep him out four to six weeks and top-pair defenseman Alexander Romanov has missed three games with an upper-body injury, though he has resumed skating.

Duclair had developed good chemistry with Bo Horvat and Mathew Barzal. Without him, the top-liners are pressing with a rotating door of wings including Simon Holmstrom, Max Tsyplakov and even Casey Cizikas again for some shifts.

“They change a lot during the game,” center Jean-Gabriel Pageau said of the lines. “You’ve just got to stay ready. Our structure doesn’t change.”

Dennis Cholowski actually became the first Islanders defenseman with a goal as he fills in for Romanov, but Roy essentially has gone with five defensemen down the stretch of games.

It’s troubling that these two absences are taxing the Islanders so much because there are going to be more injuries over the course of the season.

3. Special teams have been really bad.

The Islanders’ inability to have a consistent power play that moves the puck quickly or a penalty kill that can be counted upon is costing them games.

The penalty kill is an atrocious 3-for-9 in five home games (though 7-for-7 on the road) and the Islanders are 1-3-1 at UBS Arena. The 4-for-31 power play (12.9%) is 29th in the NHL.

By Andrew Gross

andrew.gross@newsday.comAGrossNewsday

Andrew Gross joined Newsday in 2018 to cover the Islanders. He began reporting on the NHL in 2003 and has previously covered the Rangers and Devils. Other assignments have included the Jets, St. John’s and MLB.