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The New York Islanders were one of the teams to beat in the Eastern Conference in the early 2020s, advancing to two straight Eastern Conference Finals and losing to the eventual champion Tampa Bay Lightning in both of them. The Isles are not quite as good as they once were, but the team still has one of the league's premier defensive cores and one of the game's top goaltenders in Ilya Sorokin.
Despite that, New York lost to the Carolina Hurricanes in the first round of the 2023 Stanley Cup Playoffs, a year after failing to advance altogether in 2022. That's extremely surprising considering the team made it to the final four each of the two previous seasons. It goes to show the parity in the National Hockey League, and how hard it is to win. Although the Isles are still capable of making a playoff push with the roster as currently constructed, there's one place the team has really struggled: scoring goals.
Islanders struggle to score
Bo Horvat was enjoying one of the best seasons of his career with the Vancouver Canucks in 2022-23, posting 31 goals and 54 points in 49 games before the relationship soured. Isles GM Lou Lamoriello swung for the fences, acquiring Horvat and locking him up to a mammoth eight-year, $68 million contract. Horvat scored seven goals in 30 games the rest of the way in Long Island, adding just one additional tally in a six-game loss to the Hurricanes.
Horvat's struggles in New York are part of a larger problem — this team has a very hard time scoring goals. The Islanders finished last year 22nd in goals per game, a number that they certainly will be looking to improve on in 2023-24. Now that the free agents have been signed, Lamoriello is reportedly looking to the trade market to improve the team by acquiring a scoring winger. Adding another sniper would vault the Isles from a good team into a postseason contender once again.
Isles missed out on DeBrincat, Tarasenko
Two players that would look perfect in the top six of the New York Islanders are Alex DeBrincat and Vladimir Tarasenko. But both of those players are now off limits after DeBrincat was shipped to the Detroit Red Wings and subsequently extended in his home state of Michigan, while Tarsenko somewhat surprisingly replaced him in Ottawa by signing a one-year show-me deal with the Senators earlier this summer.
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Although the Isles do not have a ton of cap space to work with, they certainly could have found a way to add Tarasenko for $5 million. Whether Lamoriello was willing to include one of top prospect William Dufour or Matthew Maggio in a DeBrincat deal is unknown, but it was clear the 40-goal scorer was excited to return to his home state.
Ideal trade targets: Jake DeBrusk, Brock Boeser
The free agent market is now extremely thin, as most of the top UFAs have found a new home. The only way to improve this team is on the trade market, and either Boston Bruins' Jake DeBrusk or Vancouver Canucks' Brock Boeser could be good options.
Boeser to the Islanders makes sense, as the two teams were already trade partners in the deal that sent Horvat to the United States and Anthony Beauvillier, Aatu Raty and a first-round draft pick back to British Columbia. The 26-year-old would be an ideal playmaker to add to the right wing. Boeser scored 18 goals and 55 points in 74 games last season, very respectable numbers for a player who was on and off the first powerplay unit. He's a good skater and could play on Brock Nelson's wing, or even reunite with Horvat. With two more years left on his contract, he's a player New York could acquire for multiple seasons.
Jake DeBrusk requested a trade out of Boston last year, but ended up having a great season with the Bruins, scoring a career-high 50 points in 64 games. With Patrice Bergeron and David Krejci retiring, the B's could use an upgrade down the middle, and Jean-Gabriel Pageau could fit in as a solid two-way center going back the other way. DeBrusk can play either left or right wing, and has scored 27 and 25 goals in the last two years. His contract is only worth $4 million as well, which is a bargain considering the way the 26-year-old played last season.
As currently constructed, the Islanders are still playoff contenders in the Metropolitan Division next season. But they could badly use an upgrade in the scoring department, and swinging a trade for Boeser or DeBrusk could be just the answer. If that happens, and Bo Horvat can return to his goal-scoring form, there's a chance New York could return to their back-to-back Eastern Conference Final form in 2024.
