Islanders Crank 43 Shots, Dominate Third, But Fall To Wild
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork/AP) — Kirill Kaprizov, Joel Eriksson Ek and Matt Boldy each had a goal and an assist, and the Minnesota Wild beat the New York Islanders 4-3 on Sunday night for their fifth straight win.
Brandon Duhamie also scored and Matt Dumba had two assists to help the Wild earn at least a point for the ninth straight game (8-0-1). Kaapo Kahkonen stopped 40 shots to improve to 10-2-2 this season.
"We're a really good team," Kahkonen said. "It's not always pretty and you don't always have your best but it's just a matter of finding ways to win."
Brock Nelson, Ross Johnston and Oliver Wahlstrom scored for New York, which has lost two straight and three of four. Ilya Sorokin finished with 17 saves as the Islanders remained 17 points behind Boston for the second wild card in the Eastern Conference.
"Whenever you lose it's frustrating," New York defenseman Scott Mayfield said. "After the first 8-10 minutes, we deserved better in that game."
Duhamie got the Wild on the scoreboard 3:36 into the game and Eriksson Ek doubled the lead with a power-play goal 57 seconds later. A few minutes after Eriksson Ek's goal, a smattering of Islanders fans began sarcastically chanting, "Let's go Wild."
"We can still do better playing with a lead," Eriksson Ek said. "I think they played better than we did for two periods. Our first was pretty good but ... we have to keep pushing."
Nelson cut Minnesota's lead in half with 6:04 remaining in the first.
Boldy pushed the Wild's lead to 3-1 with his fourth of the season at 2:39 of the second, but Johnston got the Islanders back within one with his first at 4:03.
The sequence began with Duhaime misplaying a puck at the blue line and Johnston corralled the turnover, then sped into the offensive zone before converting the semi-breakaway.
Kaprizov gave the Wild some much needed breathing room by deflecting Matt Dumba's point shot past Sorokin for his 18th of the season with 8:33 left in the third.
"They have a good power play," Nelson said of Minnesota, which finished 1 for 2 on the man advantage. "They were able to beat (Sorokin)."
Wahlstrom's power play goal with 4 minutes left capped the scoring.
"We just couldn't find a way to get it tied up," Wahlstrom said.
STREAKING
Minnesota's Kevin Fiala extended point streak to 11 with an assist on Boldy's goal. Fiala now has the second long streak in franchise history behind Mikael Granlund, who holds the record with points in 12 straight in 2016-17. ... Kaprizov extend his point streak to seven games.
CHARLES WANG COMMEMORATED
During a stoppage in play in the second period, the Islanders unveiled a plaque honoring former owner Charles Wang, who was the franchise's majority owner from 2001-16. Wang spent years attempting to negotiate an arena deal with Nassau County politicians. After the team's lease with Nassau Coliseum expired following the 2014-15 season, Wang kept the Islanders in New York as the franchise reached an agreement with Barclays Center for the team to play its home games there. Wang sold a minority interest in the team to current owners Jon Ledecky and Scott Malkin in 2014, and two years later they became the majority owners. Wang died of lung cancer on Oct. 21, 2018.
LINEUP CHANGE
About 15 minutes before the game began, the Islanders announced fourth line center Casey Cizikas would not dress "due to a non-COVID illness." Cizikas has three goals and an assist in 30 games this season.
UP NEXT
Wild: At Chicago on Wednesday night.
Islanders: Host Ottawa on Tuesday night.
(© Copyright 2022 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
