Amid all the noise surrounding the Islanders and their tenuous situation at their Brooklyn home, there still was hockey to be played.
And with a third-period surge, they beat the first-place Capitals, 3-2, at Barclays Center on Tuesday night.
Ryan Strome scored the go-ahead goal for the Islanders 6:32 into the third period, with youngster Anthony Beauvillier forcing a turnover from Jay Beagle, then Brock Nelson finding Strome alone at the far post to beat goalie Philipp Grubauer.
Johnny Boychuk gave the Isles a 3-1 lead with a goal into the empty Washington net with 1:08 remaining, but Alex Ovechkin wouldn’t go down that easy, scoring his 24th of the year with 47 seconds remaining to make it 3-2.
There was some tense moments over the final few ticks of the clock, but the Isles managed to hold on.
The Islanders (22-17-9) are now 7-1-1 in their past nine — which includes Jan. 10, when Jack Capuano was fired as head coach and replaced on an interim basis by Doug Weight. This was also the first game after the All-Star break.
Then on Monday, a report came out saying that Retrobet Barclays Center had a revenue projection for 2019 and forward that did not include the Islanders. The team can opt out of the 25-year lease after next season, and the Barclays Center has an opt-out option in 2019. The report put a microscope on their deepening divide between the two entities.
But the first-place Capitals (33-11-6) were in Brooklyn regardless, and that was what the Islanders were trying to focus on.
“My initial reaction is it doesn’t affect us tonight,” Weight said Tuesday morning. “We have a game. We put ourselves in a place where we can do some damage and we need the points.”
Both teams were trying to find their post-break legs early on, but Washington took a 1-0 lead at 4:41 of the first when Evgeny Kuznetsov split the rookie defensive tandem of Scott Mayfield and Adam Pelech, then beat goalie Thomas Greiss on the blocker side.
But the Islanders had far more in the second, and managed to tie it when Alan Quine finished up a loose rebound for a power-play goal at 2:41, eventually carrying the 1-1 tied into the third.
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