This is a question that I’ve seen come up many times over the last month, and it truly has me thinking…do the Islanders play better without Mat Barzal? I’ve seen people make cases for either side of this argument. The islanders have seemingly played better since he’s injury back in February. Is that due to his absence? “Addition by subtraction” as Andy Bernard would say? Or could it be due to other factors? I’m inclined to feel that it’s a combination of a few reasons.

The first reason being that Isles have simplified their game. Making smart decisions on the ice, while providing a strong fore-check and back-check has been the Islanders’ bread and butter over the last 5 years. It seems that they’ve gone back to that ideology. Am I saying that Barzal doesn’t fit into this ideology? Yes, that’s exactly what I’m saying. Barzy loves to handle the puck. More so than anyone on the team. With his raw talent and skill, what coach wouldn’t want to see the puck on his stick all the time? But, this has lead to a recurring problem for Barzy. He has become somewhat of turnover machine. He leads all Isles forwards with 42 giveaways. Now it’s a given that players who handle the puck more will tend to give it away more. However, Barzy has become more and more predictable as the years have gone on. For a center, he loves carrying the puck up the wing. I wouldn’t point something like that out if he didn’t do it 70-80% of the time he attempts to enter the offensive zone. Opposing teams see this coming from a mile away now, and by the time Barzy attempts to turn around, he gets closed in on. The other issue with Barzal is that he doesn’t shoot the puck nearly enough as he should. He’s a pass first kind of player, I get that. But, the time of having a sniper like Tavares to dish it off to has been over for a long time. He needs to take the shot when the opportunity presents itself; especially when he finds himself in the slot. As the saying goes, “keep it simple stupid.”

The second reason for the Isles most recent success is that other players have started to step up their game. Palmieri, Fasching, and Pelech are the few that come to mind when it comes to strong play of late. Palmer has 5 goals and 6 assists during Barzal’s absence. Putting up points is important there’s no doubt about it, but the newfound hustle in his game is what’s most important. Seeing a player as streaky as Palmieri stay consistent is a great sign of more good things to come. Fasching is another guy that has a ton of hustle in his game, and all that hustle is being rewarded. He has been killing it alongside Zeeker with 4 goals and 5 assists during Barzal’s absence. He’s been so good that Lane Lambert has no choice but to keep him up with the big boys. He ain’t just a replacement for Clutter anymore. He’s cemented himself into the starting lineup. Pelech has stepped up his game tremendously and cemented himself once again as our best defensive defenseman. He’s chipped in a bit offensively with 1 goal and 3 assists. But his 30 blocked shots, 14 hits, and 10 takeaways throughout Barzal’s absence is what really matters. His positioning has been great and he’s been staying out of the box as well which always helps. I know there are other names that I could’ve thrown into the mix for this conversation, but these 3 players have stuck out to me the most recently when it comes to improvement.

Some of you may read this and think I’m bashing Barzy, but that’s not the case at all. Barzal is an incredible player. I can’t wait to have him back alongside Horvat so they can create a bit of havoc together. Have we played well without him though? Yes. Better? Debatable. I just think that a question like this only comes up with teams that are good as whole. These teams don’t rely heavily on their superstar talent. It’s a complete team effort. You wouldn’t see anyone bring up a question like this if it was about McDavid and the Oilers. The fact of the matter is this team has stepped up as a whole. When the Isles stick to their game, I believe they can beat anyone. Whether people think it’s “boring” or not, I don’t care. When the Isles are at their best, they take the opposition into deep water and drown them. I believe they can do that with or without Barzal.

Note: all in-depth on-ice stats pulled from naturalstattrick.com