12 out of 14 games on the road. Starting out in Washington on Wednesday, against an injury ridden Capitals team who haven’t really seemed to skip a beat.
Also in the schedule for the Isles this month is the struggling Carolina Hurricanes, who couldn’t buy a win right now, an also struggling Panthers team, oh, hey, look at this, another struggling Bruins team, and a struggling Wild team. The Blues haven’t had any more luck than the aforementioned, and when it comes to the Maple Leafs, forget about it. The Isles come back to host some not-so-gracious guests Thanksgiving weekend, namely the Philadelphia Flyers and Pittsburgh Penguins, before heading out to visit their friends in New Jersey at the Rock.
With all those struggling teams, the question may be “how is this a test,” well, for one, they’re all on the road, and secondly, they need to assert themselves on these teams, save for the Pens, Flyers and Devs, not many of these teams have been feeling too confident, the Islanders need to play like they’re the underdogs still. It’s not hard to go out and play your hardest against teams with winning records, you have something to prove, when you start playing teams you should beat, is when things get a little hairy. The Islanders have played well, I won’t take that away from them, but they need to play some of their best hockey this month, hands down. Not to mention ANY of those teams are due to turn around, so here’s where the Isles can make believers out of some.
