Anders Lee lifts Islanders to 5th straight win at the death in thriller over Panthers

ELMONT, NY — Good teams find ways to win, and we’re past the point of classifying the New York Islanders as a good team.

Anders Lee powered home the game-winning goal with 30.9 seconds remaining to lift his side to a 5-4 thriller over the two-time defending Stanley Cup-champion Florida Panthers on Sunday night at UBS Arena.

“To get one, it felt like we earned it,” Lee said. “We’re excited and relieved. It’s a big two points for us. We’re putting our push on and we got teams behind us that are chasing, and we got to keep putting as much space as we can.”

With the win, New York (35-21-5) keeps its third-place perch in the Metropolitan Division, level with second-place Pittsburgh at 75 points, while opening a six-point gap in front of fourth-place Washington.

Lee, the Islanders’ captain who has goals in three straight games, bulled his way down the left wing and cut across the face of goal on his forehand before slotting his chance past the right foot of Sergei Bobrovsky for the game-winner.

“I finally got a puck I liked tonight,” Lee said. “It was one of those nights where we just had to stick with it… I was just able to get around the D-man there and slide it past him.”

It is the Islanders’ fifth straight victory, which includes three straight now to start the post-Olympic portion of the schedule. They pulled out their first two games after the break in overtime, including a 4-3 overtime win to defeat the Blue Jackets in Columbus less than 24 hours earlier on Saturday.

“These are some big games,” rookie phenom Matthew Schaefer said. “The last couple games, we’ve been down by a couple goals and fought back super hard. It just feels like everybody finds that peace of mind where they’re like, ‘We need these wins. We have to battle back here.'”

Schaefer continued his torrid rookie campaign with a pair of goals, including what was a go-ahead goal with 9:31 to go in regulation, and an assist. He has four goals in his last three games, which included two in Thursday’s 4-3 overtime win over the Montreal Canadiens to set the NHL record for most goals by an 18-year-old defenseman. Now up to 20 goals on the season, he is just the 22nd player at any position in NHL history to reach that benchmark at this age.

He is also the first Islanders defenseman to score 20 goals in a season since Denis Potvin in 1985-86.

“Twenty goals… I wouldn’t be able to do it if it wasn’t for these guys,” Schaefer said. “They made it such an easy transition to just come in the NHL and come into a team that I didn’t know a lot of people coming here.”

His second tally of the night came off a feed from Ondrej Palat, with Schaefer moving just inside the left face-off circle before sending a wrister through the five-hole of Panthers goalie Sergei Bobrovsky.

Florida’s Sam Reinhart potted the tying goal with 1:58 to go in regulation when his wrister snuck over the shoulder of Islanders backup goalie David Rittich, setting up Lee’s dramatics.

Trailing 2-0 late in the first period, Schaefer got the Islanders on the board with 1:59 to go when his one-timer from atop the right circle ricocheted off the forest of bodies in front of the net and softly looped over Bobrovsky. The puck hit off the crossbar and then off the veteran netminder’s back and into the net.

“He’s doing things very special out there,” head coach Patrick Roy said. “The quality of his decision-making is impressive as well. He’s jumping in on those plays, and right now, he’s shooting with confidence. As a result, he’s scored a couple goals. One was a lucky one.”

Defenseman Carson Soucy drew the Islanders level with a sneaky wrister from the left circle that snuck under the glove of Bobrovsky 7:28 into the second period.

Panthers forward Sam Bennett picked up his second goal of the night to put the visitor ahead — his transitional backhander from the right circle sneaking under the arm of Rittich.

The Islanders’ backup netminder struggled in his first appearance since the Olympic break, as he undoubtedly would have liked to have gotten each of the first three goals he conceded back. He lifted his left pad up while sliding over to his left post just enough to allow Sandis Vilmanis to slot the opening goal of the night home 3:44 into the first period. He then could not track Bennett’s first goal of the night at the 14:54 mark — an unscreened wrister on the power play that was not deflected, either.

After allowing two goals on his first four shots, though, he stopped 27 of the last 29 pucks that came his way.

“It was not his best game, but it was not always my best game,” Roy said. “Sometimes you have to battle, and that’s what he did. He made some good saves in the third period to keep us in it.”

Bo Horvat tied things up at three at the 17:14 mark of the second period with a tight-angled shot from just above the left goal line that found a way through Bobrovsky.

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