Islanders brace for early highway journey, beginning at Stars

The New York Islanders didn’t have to look far for an idea of how to handle their first road trip of the season.

After a difficult loss, the Islanders will embark on a three-game trek Saturday night when they visit the Dallas Stars in the second contest of the season for both teams.

New York and Dallas were off Friday after debuting Thursday. The Islanders squandered a pair of third-period leads in a 5-4 overtime loss to the visiting Utah Hockey Club in Elmont, N.Y., while the host Stars held off a comeback attempt by the Nashville Predators in a 4-3 victory.

Rookie Maxim Tsyplakov gave the Islanders their third lead of the night by scoring his first NHL goal with 2:07 left in regulation. But Josh Doan scored just 13 seconds later for Utah, which earned the win when Dylan Guenther scored 2:18 into overtime.

The win improved Utah to 2-0-0 during a challenging five-game opening stretch that resembles the Islanders’ start. The club, which relocated from Arizona following last season, beat the Chicago Blackhawks 5-3 on Tuesday before beginning a road trip that consists of three games against the New York-area teams and ends at the Anaheim Ducks.

After visiting the Stars, the Islanders fly west to face the Colorado Avalanche Monday before heading back to the Central time zone to battle the St. Louis Blues Thursday.

“This is the schedule — let’s not find excuses for whatever it is, let’s go out there and play our game and play the right way,” Islanders coach Patrick Roy said. “That’s exactly what Utah did (Thursday) night. They played two nights before at home, that was a home opener. Flew the next day and they came and played a great game against us. So we need to do the exact same thing.”

The Stars would like to replicate their second-period performance Thursday, when they scored all four of their goals despite being outshot 13-7. Roope Hintz, Jason Robertson and Mason Marchment scored in a span of 5:58 prior to the midway point of the second, and Marchment extended Dallas’ lead to 4-1 with 1:45 left.

Nashville outshot the Stars 15-9 in the third, pulled goalie Scott Wedgewood with 2:48 left and cut Dallas’ lead to one goal when Ryan O’Reilly scored 73 seconds later. But the Predators produced just one more shot against Jake Oettinger, who finished with 33 saves.

“It’s Game 1,” Stars coach Pete DeBoer said. “A lot of things to work on for everybody, but a tough rink to come into against a really good team. I thought we were in full control of that game at 4-1. We gave them a little bit of life there in the third, but that’s all a learning process for us.”

The Stars will be looking to win their fifth straight home opener Saturday. Dallas is 7-2-1 in its last 10 openers at American Airlines Arena dating back to the 2014-15 season.

–Field Level Media