ST. LOUIS — The 2023-24 Islanders have been nothing but bizarre, so here came another inexplicable chapter of the season.
The Islanders on Tuesday played a generally unobjectionable 59:28 of hockey, but found a way to lose 4-0 to the Blues thanks to a 32-second spurt straight out of their own nightmares.
Right when the Islanders appeared on their way to killing off Kyle MacLean’s second period penalty for slashing, Brandon Saad got free at the backdoor to convert Oskar Sundqvist’s pass for a 1-0 lead.
Seven seconds after that, after the Islanders won the ensuing faceoff, they failed to corral the puck and lost track of their men in the defensive zone, allowing Pavel Buchnevich to score.
Then 25 seconds after that — with Patrick Roy calling timeout in the interim — they let Buchnevich get free yet again to make it 3-0 in less than the time of a bathroom break.
It was the fastest three goals in Blues history and, unofficially, the fastest banana-peel slip in Islander history.
They exited the second period having outshot the Blues 20-9 over 20 minutes, while simultaneously having lost their grip on the game — a stat that feels representative of the season far more than one period of one game.
There was no coming back for a team whose mental fragility was the theme of the night, though Patrick Roy did keep things interesting by moving Mathew Barzal to the third line with Oliver Wahlstrom taking his spot on the first for the rest of the game.
Roy also switched up his defensive pairs, with Adam Pelech skating with Noah Dobson while Alexander Romanov went with Ryan Pulock.
Buchnevich completed his hat trick after Roy pulled Semyon Varlamov on a four-on-four with over 10 minutes left in the game, scoring into an empty net to complete the Islanders’ misery.