The Islanders dropped their contest with the Pittsburgh Penguins 4-3 in a shootout at Nassau Coliseum on Feb. 11. Casey DeSmith shut down Josh Bailey in the third round of the shootout and Sidney Crosby scored the only goal of the skills competition. DeSmith made 26 saves in the win while Semyon Varlamov took the loss in a 32-save performance.

Casey Cizikas got the Islanders on the board first with a highlight-reel goal just over five minutes into the game. Cizikas picked up a shallow dump-in ahead of John Marino, outmuscled the Pittsburgh defender and went backhand-forehand on DeSmith while falling. Pittsburgh tied things up with just over eight to play in the first with a tic-tac-toe play between Crosby, Jake Guentzel and the goal scorer, Bryan Rust. The assist was Crosby’s career 50th road point against the Isles. A late-period power play gave New York a chance to take back the lead. JG Pageau deflected home a Nick Leddy point shot to make the score 2-1 gong into the break.

In the second period, Zach Aston-Reese tied the game back up in his season debut, jamming away on the doorstep after taking the puck out from behind the goal.

Mat Barzal one-upped Cizikas, undressing Pierre-Oliver Joseph and hit the top corner past Casey DeSmith to give the Islanders a 3-2 lead with under seven minutes to play and extend his point streak to seven games. Evgeni Malkin tied the score with just 18 seconds to go to send the game to the extra session. It was his third of the season, second against the Islanders. Both teams had chances in overtime but DeSmith and Varlamov both stood tall.

Despite the loss, the Islanders extend their point streak to five games with a 2-0-3 record in that span.

Up next, the Islanders host the Boston Bruins on Feb. 13 at 7 o’clock. Boston’s only regulation loss so far came against the Islanders on Jan. 18.

John Smark