New York Islanders coach Patrick Roy, center, calls out to players during the first period of the team’s NHL hockey game against the Vegas Golden Knights on Tuesday, Jan. 23, 2024, in Elmont, N.Y. (AP Photo/Frank Franklin II)
EAST MEADOW, N.Y. — The New York Islanders still have some habits to shake off to fully embrace what new head coach Patrick Roy is attempting to institute. That’s only natural.
“When you’ve been in a certain kind of system for years, those habits aren’t easy to break,” star forward Mathew Barzal told amNewYork. “Ask anybody who’s been addicted to anything or had a habit of doing anything. We’re trying to break certain things, break certain habits, and create new ones.”
Since Lou Lamoriello’s arrival before the 2018-19 season and the regimes of the club’s two previous head coaches, Barry Trotz and Lane Lambert, the notion of manning the ramparts has been drilled into the Islanders’ minds. That means absorbing the pressure, playing a defensive-first game, and not take too many chances offensively.
It was safe, maybe even too safe — a tactic used for a team that doesn’t necessarily boast the attacking talent to keep up with the opposition.
But the 2023-24 Islanders have the sort of playmaking talent to make such a system an archaic one. Mathew Barzal and Bo Horvat are flirting with point-per-game paces. Brock Nelson is on his way toward a third-straight 30-goal season. Noah Dobson is producing at a Norris Trophy-level clip with 47 assists and 54 points across his first 52 games.
That’s the kind of talent that, under Lambert, was being told to make that defensive shell a priority. Because of that, the play suffered to the point of a 12-game stretch that featured nine losses and the eventual firing of the head coach in late January.
In stepped Roy, who is trying to adjust the team’s mindset on the fly with varying results. When his system is working, they can dominate teams as they did on Feb. 8…
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