NEW YORK _ There are peaks and valleys in every hockey season. Not usually from one period to the next. But the Islanders peaked at the right time on Thursday, finishing strong after blowing a two-goal lead to rally for a 6-4 win over the Hurricanes.
Johnny Boychuk's one-timer beat Carolina goaltender Scott Darling with 4:25 to play to give the Isles the lead for good. It capped off a strange game in which the Islanders seized a 3-1 lead after a period, fell behind 4-3 after the second and pulled out a win with a strong final 20 minutes, their first win in seven games when trailing after two.
"We were snoozing a bit in the second but we have some great leaders in here, they told us we needed to wake up and we were sharp in the third," said Mathew Barzal, who had a goal and two assists. "You could feel it that first shift of the third, we came out strong, really raised our level."
Barzal got clocked in the face by Noah Hanifin's stick to put the Islanders (10-6-2) on the power play at 6:31 of the third. Barzal got the tying goal started with a pass intended for John Tavares that deflected down near the net to Anders Lee; he slid a no-look pass behind him for Josh Bailey's slam dunk, the Isles' first power-play goal in 11 tries, to tie it 4-4 at 7:22.
A game with huge swings like Thursday's didn't exactly settle down after that, with both teams coming close to taking the lead until Casey Cizikas drove hard up the right side, pulled up, drew two Carolina players close and dropped a puck for Boychuk's big slap shot and a late go-ahead score.
"It says a lot about where we are as a team right now that we can bounce back like we did," said Cizikas, whose line with Cal Clutterbuck and Jason Chimera was a force all night. "You're not going to play every period perfect. It's how you respond."
Perfect was a far cry from how the Islanders played the middle 20 minutes. The Hurricanes (7-6-4) are a young, fast team and they showed it early and often in the second, pouncing on small breakdowns to pull even and then take the lead on Sebastian Aho's goal with 51.6 seconds left in the second.
That negated three Islander goals in the final 3:39 of the first, with Barzal scoring off the rush, Clutterbuck scoring on a shorthanded breakaway and Nick Leddy slapping one that Darling misplayed into the net.
