ST. PAUL — The Islanders needed something. From the start of the season through Nov. 25, they carried a 6-11-4 record in the NHL’s toughest division. There was talk that coach Jack Capuano was on the hot seat and the path to the postseason was hazy at best.

Fast-forward to the first week of 2017 and things are looking up with an 9-5-3 record since that rough start. They’re climbing the standings despite being in a division that carries the three best records in the NHL and four of the top seven. A huge part of that success has been the offensive explosion of Edina-native Anders Lee.

“I think [my success is] just continuing to play my game. I’m finding my game, not trying to do too much, getting the bounces, and things have been just rolling really well right now,” he said before a Dec. 29 game against his hometown Minnesota Wild.

Lee started the season ice cold, scoring just one goal in his first 18 games with a 3.3 shooting percentage. In the 19 games since then, Lee has 13 goals and a 30.2 shooting percentage.

“You’ve got to stay positive in situations like that [slump], where you’re pressing and you’re playing good hockey but it doesn’t show,” Lee said. “That’s the hardest part I think, trying to figure out when you are playing a good game and when you are really are struggling. Stuff like shooting percentage, you know it’s always going to go back up. It can’t stay low like that forever.”

His 10 even-strength goals in that time frame are second to Auston Matthews (12) and lead with Sidney Crosby (9). His 13 all-situation goals in that span also rank second only to Crosby (14) and Matthews (15).

In that same span, his 13 goals lead the team by a good margin. The closest to that total are Andrew Ladd (6), John Tavares (6), and Brock Nelson (4), who potted a pair against the Wild on Thursday. Lee’s 16 overall points also lead the team since Nov. 23.

Capuano loves Lee’s work ethic and his willingness to attack “the hard areas of the ice” to score.

“It’s not a coincidence around the league that guys that score a lot of goals are going to those areas, they’re not perimeter guys,” Capuano said. “That’s the one thing that he’s always done since we’ve had him here in Bridgeport (AHL) or with the Islanders is that he’s a fearless type player and he goes to those areas.”

The timing of his surge has proved important for the Isles and fortunate for fans in Minnesota. The Islanders arrived at the Xcel Energy Center in late December with Lee in the most torrid stretch of his career. “It’s always fun to get back and see friends and family and see everyone after the game,” he said. “It’s just a special night because you grow up watching the Wild and playing here in the high school tournament.

“My freshman year I was able to win the state championship and it was just a wonderful experience. Every year coming back and playing in front of 18,000 fans for a high school game was impressive.”

However, Lee isn’t losing focus on the big picture. The Islanders have begun turning things around, but climbing the Metropolitan might be more difficult than scaling Everest. While the Isles entered the X with a three-game winning streak, which was snapped, it’s not enough in a division where every team is hot.

The Blue Jackets win streak reached 16 games. The Penguins are on a four-game streak and are 12-1-2 in their last 15. The Rangers are 10-4-0 in their last 14. The Capitals had a six-game streak last month and are 11-2-2 in their last 15, including a streak-snapping 5-0 win over Columbus. The Flyers had a 10-game win streak in December.

Even at the bottom of the division, teams aren’t falling apart. The Hurricanes are 7-5-2 in their last 14.

“For us right now, we know where we are,” said Lee. “We know where we sit and it’s not pretty. We’ve got to take it game by game and work out of it. There’s still so much hockey left that if you’re watching every game in the standings, you’re going to be thinking about things that can just cloud your game. “

Fellow Minnesotan and Islander forward Brock Nelson feels similarly. “A couple teams, they’ve been on a roll,” he said. “Hopefully we can get back in that group. There’s a lot of hockey left. We know where we are. We just gotta go out there and take it one game at a time.”

Nelson put together a nice game against the Wild, leading a comeback bid with two goals just 42 seconds apart. It wasn’t enough, but the pieces are starting to fall into place for the Islanders, led in part by their Minnesota contingent. However, it’s going to take a Herculean effort to catapult the team up the standings in a division where teams aren’t losing many games.

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Kyle Okposo scores the first of two go-ahead goals in the third period of the Islanders 5-4 win over the Wild on Dec. 29, 2013 in St. Paul.
(MHM Photo/Jeff Wegge)

All but Ness registered points as they combined for seven points (3-4–7) and 12 shots while finishing a +3 as the Islanders spotted Minnesota a three-goal lead before outscoring the Wild 5-1 over the game’s final 37 minutes in front of the 18,851 announced in attendance. Okposo led the way with the Isles final two goals and chipped in an assist for his first NHL points in his fourth professional appearance in St. Paul.

“We just kept chipping away and kept chipping away,” Okposo said. “We were down 3-0 and kind of re-grouped. We decided to go after them and start moving our feet. For the first 22 minutes we weren’t doing that, so we decided to get pucks deep and go to the net.”

Okposo said the Islanders did a good job of dictating the play in the third period, something he had a lot to do with scoring two go-ahead goals in a 1:59 span culminating with the game winner with 5:48 to go.

“It was a good one to leave the hometown fans with,” Okposo said with a grin. “I heard about five or six cheers in the audience when I scored, but it’s nice to come home and get a win like that.”

Thomas Vanek
(MHM Photo/Jeff Wegge)

Islanders coach Jack Capuano praised his top line of Okposo, Vanek and John Tavares who conspired to produce six points (3-3–6) between them on the night.

“The first period they really struggled and were trying to do a little bit too much,” Capuano said. “In the second and third they got back to playing how they know to play. They generated a lot in the offensive zone and the puck protection was great. Their skill really showed.”

Clutterbuck, who accumulated a franchise-leading 1,457 hits in 346 games over parts of six seasons with the Wild, scored his fifth of the season with 1:02 to go in the second (assisted by Nelson) providing the Islanders with a huge momentum boost heading into the final period.

“We kind of gave ourselves a kick in the butt here in the room and decided to kick it into high gear,” said Clutterbuck, the 26-year-old former Wild fan favorite who returned for the first time since being dealt on draft day, along with a 2013 third-round pick, in exchange for Nino Niederreiter.

“It was different—it was a little odd and almost had a training camp split squad feeling to it—but it was good,” Clutterbuck said of his triumphant return. “I didn’t know what to expect, but it ended up working out pretty nice.

Cal Clutterbuck
(MHM Photo/Jeff Wegge)

“There’s a little bit of nostalgia but my mind has been so focused on this team and where we at that it’s nice to be back, but it’s nice to turn the page too.”

Niederreiter, selected No. 5 overall by the Islanders in the 2010 NHL Draft, was mostly relegated to fourth-line duties during his time on Long Island and his production—two goals and one assist in 64 games over parts of two seasons—reflected that. But Sunday he joined Mikko Koivu and Charlie Coyle on the Wild’s top line and chipped in a goal and an assist in his debut against his former team.

But Niederreiter admitted Minnesota’s fifth consecutive loss—at home and to a team currently last in its division—tarnished any satisfaction he may have otherwise received from those two points.

“We lost, so that’s the frustrating part about it,” Niederreiter added. “It was our fault, we were up 3-0 and we let them push back.

“At some point, I feel like we stopped playing the way we should be playing, made too many hope passes and hope plays. That cost us the game.”

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