The Islanders have spent the opening stretch of the 2026-27 season juggling injuries, lineup changes, and all the usual chaos that comes with trying to stay afloat when key pieces keep disappearing. Even so, they’ve managed to keep finding points and stacking results.
That hasn’t done much to move the needle in the NHL power rankings, though. Sean Gentille and Dom Luszczyszyn of The Athletic bumped New York up just one spot this week, from No. 15 to No. 14, and that feels light considering what the team has been dealing with.
The absences are real and they’re heavy. Mathew Barzal still hasn’t played this season.
Alexander Romanov, after returning from the shoulder injury that ended his last season, is now out for the year again after an ACL injury in the third game. Calum Ritchie and Matias Maccelli both went down on Oct. 17 in the Islanders’ 4-1 win over the Toronto Maple Leafs.
That leaves three top-six forwards sidelined, plus a major part of the club’s defensive setup.
And yet the Islanders keep hanging around.
They’ve picked up at least one point in seven of their last eight games, and the results have pushed them up the Metropolitan Division and the Eastern Conference standings. The bigger reason for the surge is the way the group has bought into Peter DeBoer’s system. The defensive structure, in particular, has taken a noticeable step forward from where it was under Patrick Roy.
At the center of it all is Matthew Schaefer, who has been putting together the kind of stretch that jumps off the page. Against the Nashville Predators, in a 3-3 game the Islanders won in a shootout, Schaefer was on the ice for the full five-minute overtime. That made him the first player on record to do that, and it also set the franchise record for the longest shift.
He wasn’t done there. In the final game of the road trip against the Minnesota Wild, Schaefer logged another 30-minute night, scored twice, and buried the overtime winner while also adding an assist. No player this century has matched those marks in a single game.
Schaefer isn’t the only one outperforming expectations. His partner on the No. 1 pair, Logan Stanley, has been better than expected, and several veterans have looked sharper too, including Brayden Schenn and Ondrej Palat.
DeBoer has been forced to keep adjusting the lineup, mostly because he has to, but the way the players have responded is giving the Islanders real traction. Guys are skating hard, sticking with the system, and producing enough to keep the team moving in the right direction.
In Other News...
Matthew Schaefer Is Already Earning The Kind Of Praise Islanders Fans Crave
After the Islanders 4-3 overtime win against the Minnesota Wild, Matthew Schaefer picked up something every young defenseman wants early in his career: a public nod from one of the games best. Quinn Hughes, the 2024 Norris Trophy winner, praised the 2025 NHL Draft first overall pick and pointed to the way Schaefer has already handled the jump to the league at 19, a stretch that has come with 95 NHL games and the kind of attention that usually follows elite blue-liners.
For Islanders fans, the appeal goes beyond the highlights and the draft pedigree. Schaefer was the first unanimous Calder Trophy winner since 1992, and Hughes comments only added to the sense that the Islanders may already have a cornerstone on defense. The bigger question now is how high that trajectory can go as he matures, because the leagues top voices are starting to talk about him in a way that suggests his ceiling is still very much ahead of him. [Read more 🡒]
Logan Stanley Has Become Crucial To An Islanders Blue Line In Crisis
Injuries have forced the Islanders to keep reshuffling their blue line, and the latest adjustment has given Logan Stanley a larger role than anyone might have expected. With Alexander Romanov out for the season after an ACL injury, the team has had to lean on depth and flexibility, and Stanley has answered by handling tougher minutes while still giving the club some offense and steadiness at the back end.
The bigger test has been how well he fits with the rest of the defense corps as the pairings continue to change around him. Stanley has looked comfortable alongside different partners, and head coach Peter DeBoer has managed the situation well enough to keep the group organized despite the constant disruption. For a team trying to survive a crisis on defense, that kind of stability has mattered as much as any single highlight play. [Read more 🡒]