Islanders 5, Kings 2
NEW YORK -- The New York Islanders scored three goals in less than eight minutes in the first period Thursday and maintained their season-long mastery of Pacific Division foes at Barclays Center with a 5-2 victory over the Los Angeles Kings.
The Islanders and Kings became the first teams this season to score eight and nine goals in a game earlier this week in routs of the Edmonton Oilers (whom the Islanders beat 8-1 on Sunday) and Boston Bruins (Kings 9-2 on Tuesday).
Only the Islanders were able to maintain the goal-scoring magic Thursday when defenseman Johnny Boychuk -- who scored the first goal in Sunday's rout --began the first period barrage at 6:05.
Center Casey Cizikas and center Anders Lee scored later in the first while center John Tavares scored in the second and defenseman Travis Hamonic added an empty netter with 3:25 left in the third for the Islanders (29-18-6), who won their third straight to increase their lead over the idle Pittsburgh Penguins and New Jersey Devils in the race for third place in the Metropolitan Division.
The three-goal third period marked the 16th time this season the Islanders have scored at least three goals in a period and the eighth time they did it against a Pacific Division team at home. New York finished 6-0-1 at Barclays against the Pacific.
Goaltender Thomas Greiss made 28 saves.
Left winger Kyle Clifford scored in the second period while left winger Milan Lucic scored in the third for the Kings (32-18-3), who have lost five of eight (3-5-0).
Goalie Jhonas Enroth, starting in place of the injured Jonathan Quick, recorded 25 saves.
Boychuk put the Islanders ahead 6:05 into the game when he took a curl pass from Tavares and fired a slap shot from beyond the right faceoff circle that sailed under Enroth's glove.
Cizikas' goal with 8:41 remaining capped a gritty effort begun by right winger Cal Clutterbuck, who wriggled free of defenseman Luke Schenn along the boards and passed to left winger Matt Martin. Enroth deflected Martin's shot, but the puck bounced to Cizikas, who dumped it into the wide-open right corner of the net.
The Islanders extended the lead to 3-0 just 2:17 later, when Lee got a stick on a shot by defenseman Nick Leddy that managed to sail between six players in front of Enroth.
Clifford put the Kings on the board at 11:10 of the second, when he jammed back the rebound of his own shot into the right corner.
But Tavares made it a three-goal game again a mere 2:20 later, when he took a pass from center Ryan Strome, went up the right side of the ice and fired a shot past both a sliding Schenn and Enroth.
NOTES: The Islanders scratched RW Steve Bernier, G Jean-Francois Berube and D Marek Zidlicky. ... The Kings are the last Western Conference team to make their first visit to Barclays Center. Three Eastern Conference teams -- the Ottawa Senators, Pittsburgh Penguins and Tampa Bay Lightning -- have yet to play the Islanders in Brooklyn. ... The Kings scratched G Jonathan Quick (undisclosed injury), D Jamie McBain, LW Tanner Pearson and D Nick Shore. ... The Kings recalled D Kevin Gravel from Ontario of the AHL and assigned D Christian Ehrhoff to the same affiliate. Los Angeles also recalled G Peter Budaj on an emergency basis.