The Islanders continue their trip on the road with games against Dallas and a final stop to Phoenix. After a glorious win by Roloson and the Isles, many are speculating that Rick DiPietro, finally recovered from injuries, may and should get a start in one of the next two games. I completely disagree. Allow me to explain.
I'm sure as most fans by now have seen or are looking at the standings and seeing that the Islanders are back to the NHL .500 mark. That is the good news. The better news is that the teams ahead of the Islanders are not doing as well or should be playing better then the Isles.
So where's the bad news? The Isles might start DiPietro. Don't get me wrong, no one is more thrilled to see DP come back then me. However, if the islanders truly want to make a run at the playoffs or become this years big spoilers (as I have predicted), then Roloson needs to play in as many games as possible, even if that means playing in the next two. I'll even take Biron over DiPietro right now because, let's face it, he hasn't played an NHL game in a little over a year. Let him earn his way back in practice to get a back up start, and go from there.
You can't tell me that DP will play better than Biron with the offense in front of him, the same offense that produces an 1.8 goals for average for Biron. There is no way in hell DP, coming back in his first game, will allow 1 goal or less. He couldn't do that even when he's healthy. If the Isles truly want to win, play Biron for now.
There will come a time when Biron will be traded and DP will get his starts, but the offense must start coming together now and score to really support the goaltending. Fans are starting to see some improvement in players that should have been scoring earlier in the season, but are only now starting to show signs of getting out of there slump/growing pains. I can't see the Islanders winning a lot of one goal games the rest of this season, not the way they give goals back in the third periods.
The other teams ahead of the Islanders do not have three goalies that could be starters elsewhere. The Islanders must win the next two games to really start getting into the minds of other teams because lets face it, the other teams are not performing as well as they should and the Islanders must take advantage of this opportunity. Playing DP on this road trip is not taking advantage of what the Islanders could have after this weekend, nervous team.
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