New York Islanders: Previews, breakdowns, and prediction for the 2018-2019 Season

What the line up will look like.

The New York Islanders were a team that started off hot last year then had a very humbling descend down the standings.

The team looked fresh with players like Joshua Ho-Sang and Mat Barzal at the helm.

The Isles were in a playoff spot and had an offense that should be remembered as historic.

Then,the reality set in.

The Isles, last year, couldn’t keep up with the daily grind of the NHL and an abysmal defense finally asserted its dominance and the Isles ended up plummeting down the standings and well out of playoff contention.

So, with that, what did they do to get better?

Well, that answer is complicated.

They lost John Tavares and didn’t exactly make up for it in a big or grandiose way. Rather, they decided to promote Barzal to the top line and then change the identity of the team.

Now, the Isles are going for more of the “grinder” type of hockey, at least in my eyes. They bolstered their bottom two lines, okay, maybe not bolstered but they changed those up the most.

To get an idea of what it might look like, here is long-time Isles beat writer Arthur Staples’s projection for this year, it is probably correct.

That is least how they will lineup in the earliest stages of the season. Please note, Andrew Ladd is on IR and continues to aggravate fans after that contract.

So, the Isles forwards/center combinations is not exactly ideal.

What it is though, is different. Perhaps the biggest thing with this lineup is that they realized that what they have had the last two years did not work and any change is better than none at all.

What it also is, is a mixture of the old and new.

More from New York Islanders

• New York Islanders Force Game Six in Double OT
• New York Islanders Make History, Advance to Conference Finals
• New York Islanders Move within One Game of Eastern Conference Finals
• New York Islanders Take 2-1 Series Lead on Philadelphia
• New York Islanders Beat Capitals and are Moving On

The Matt Martin line is the same fan-favorite one from three years ago that played well.

So overall, the Isles didn’t upgrade into anything special. They also do not seem ready to use the plethora of talent they have in the system and give them starts in the NHL right now.

That might all be for the better, but at the end of the day, this is probably not what the Isles want, but the best they could do right now.

The good news is, that their defense cannot be much worse than it was last year.

At least the defensive pairings will have some continuity. That goes a long way in a part of the game where knowing where your teammates will be and the ground they can cover is key.

Ryan Pulock looked like he is ready to play this year, that is at least going off the recent preseason games he played. He is going to be in the lineup and he is a key to the Isles’ success.

If he can keep scoring goals and be a solid body on the blue line, the Isles will already be fractionally improved from where they were last season.

The biggest upgrade, or at least most notable change for the Isles is not bringing Matt Martin back. That is nice, but not the biggest.

The Isles’ biggest change is in-goal. The Isles struck out with their goalie pairings last season.

Jaroslav Halak, as good as he was in the past for the blue and orange, just was not the same last year, now he is else where.

Once again, Thomas Greiss failed to prove he is a stout regular season goalie. He will likely be back as a backup this year, no matter how many saves he can make on a given night, he is not the answer.

The Islanders’ new goalie is Robin Lehner. He will emerge as the number one goalie and is on a prove it contract this year. The Isles seem to be high on him and he was one of, if not the best available tveteran goalie in free agency this offseason.

Also, the catch here is that even if Lehner does poorly, the Isles can still work in Greiss where they know what they have.

Also, this could at least buy the Isles another year until the goalie of their future *cough Ilya Sorkin cough* is eventually ready to be on the Island in the NHL.

So, the Isles lineup, like said, is not exactly what you want. An only kind of proven Mat Barzal is anchoring the way. He has potential, and was a great rookie, but to call him a perennial star we would need to see more long-term success.

He is ready, however.

So, the Islanders are not exactly a hot-mess, but on paper their roster looks weak compared to the rest of the NHL powerhouses.

This is a wait and see kind of team. However, in the back of our minds, the best thing to see out of this team is proper development and a slow build to awesome chemistry.

The sky is not the limit for this team, so baby steps first would be nice.

Next, we preview the schedule and provide some more quick analysis looking ahead into the season.