RALEIGH, N.C. — It took just 20 seconds of playoff hockey for Ryan Pulock to step up the intensity.

As the Hurricanes’ Jack Drury came to play the puck along the right wall in the Carolina zone, Pulock lined him up.

The Islanders defenseman then threw his right shoulder into Drury, leveling the 23-year-old.

That was the tone-setter the Islanders wanted for their first-round playoff series.

“I think we can feed off each other in that way,” Pulock said Tuesday, a day after the Islanders’ 2-1 loss in Game 1.

“When guys see other guys playing hard, playing physical, I think it can kinda carry over. And I think I’m at a point now, I’ve had the experience in the playoffs and trying to be a leader and trying to set the tone a little bit.”

The Islanders took notice of Pulock’s Game 1 performance, in which he delivered nine hits, scored the team’s only goal and skated 22:14.

He played with both Adam Pelech and Samuel Bolduc as the Islanders rotated through defensive pairings.

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“I thought he was our best player last night by a mile,” Mathew Barzal said. “The rest of us gotta match that.”

“The most physical game I’ve seen him play,” coach Lane Lambert said. “I thought he played amazing.”

That is the sort of performance the Islanders need Pulock, and their other defensemen, to replicate on Wednesday in Game 2.

A win would let them steal away both home ice and momentum in the series before it shifts back to Long Island on Friday night.

In a season during which Adam Pelech missed considerable time and the Islanders’ second and third defense pairs have been made up of younger players, Pulock has been the most consistent player on their back end.

Pulock spent nearly all of Game 1 matched up against Carolina’s top two defensive pairs, with a healthy dosage of Jordan Staal’s checking line, which presents myriad problems in the postseason.

That especially showed up in transition, as the Islanders struggled to break the puck out.

“There’s not a ton of time there,” Pulock said. “They do a good job, they’re aggressive. We can improve for sure in that area of maybe making a few more plays, just having a bit more poise in the neutral zone, a little bit more possession. Throughout a series, you can learn little things in little areas.”

The physical tone Pulock set early was very much a plus for the Islanders, who out-hit Carolina in the official count and looked to have an advantage there.

That’s especially important without Alexander Romanov, who can throw the sort of hits that change games in the postseason, but continues to deal with an upper-body injury.

Pulock stepping into the role of enforcer could buoy the Islanders.

Romanov didn’t skate on Tuesday, but neither did anyone on the Islanders, who were off.

The 23-year-old Russian is in Raleigh and skated on his own prior to Game 1.

Lambert did not reveal whether Romanov will play in Game 2.

Without him, the Islanders have heavily rotated their pairings to try and protect Bolduc and Noah Dobson, who spent much of his time on Monday playing alongside Pelech.

If Romanov returns, it figures that the Islanders will go back to the configurations they used prior to his injury, with Pelech next to Scott Mayfield and Romanov with Pulock.

Regardless, the Islanders will need Pulock to bring the same kind of performance he did on Monday.

“For myself, I had a mindset of playing hard, playing physical and it’s how it worked out to start the game,” Pulock said. “I think moving forward, I’m gonna try to keep that mentality of playing hard and being physical when I can.”