{"id":256578,"date":"2025-11-02T01:29:10","date_gmt":"2025-11-02T01:29:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/256578\/"},"modified":"2025-11-02T01:29:10","modified_gmt":"2025-11-02T01:29:10","slug":"anthony-duclair-continues-to-disappear-for-islanders","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/256578\/","title":{"rendered":"Anthony Duclair continues to disappear for Islanders"},"content":{"rendered":"

The idea that Anthony Duclair would walk in this season as if he hadn\u2019t missed a step, put the injury-addled mess that was 2024-25 behind him and be the 25-goal, 40-plus-point player the Islanders thought they were signing in July 2024 was always fanciful, even for the most optimistic observer.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Still, 11 games into the Islanders\u2019 season, the state of play for Duclair doesn\u2019t look that much better than it did last March, when he was playing his way into coach Patrick Roy\u2019s public ire on a torn groin<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The 30-year-old Duclair has three points in 11 games, and on a per-60-minute basis is barely scraping a better scoring rate than he did last season \u2014 1.1 points vs. 1.0. It\u2019s not just the lack of points, either. Duclair is disappearing for games at a time. <\/p>\n

He has an abysmal 35.28 expected goals rate at five-on-five, and that\u2019s despite playing a significant chunk of minutes alongside Mat Barzal, whose 47.47 xGF rate is fifth on the Islanders.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"CharlieCharlie McAvoy of the Boston Bruins dives for the puck ahead of Anthony Duclair of the New York Islanders during the second period at TD Garden on October 28, 2025 in Boston, Massachusetts. Getty Images<\/p>\n

After an unproductive spell on Barzal\u2019s wing, Duclair was dropped from the top line to the fourth, and bumped off the second power-play unit, for Friday night\u2019s 3-1 win over Washington<\/a> to make room for Cal Ritchie, and it\u2019s getting easy to wonder whether Max Shabanov\u2019s eventual return from an upper-body injury will result in his spot in the lineup becoming at risk.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s improving each and every game,\u201d Duclair told The Post last week when asked to evaluate his game. \u201cI think it\u2019s improving each and every game. Feeling more and more confident as we go along here.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cPersonally, I could be more aggressive. Get to the net more, get some shots off. In terms of how I\u2019m feeling, I\u2019m feeling great. No complaints. I just want to keep improving every day.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

The groin, he said, is completely fine, though like many players coming off long-term injuries, perhaps there\u2019s still a degree of confidence missing from Duclair\u2019s game.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s hard coming back from injury,\u201d Kyle Palmieri, who has done so more than once and who until Friday was on Duclair\u2019s line, told The Post. \u201cIt\u2019s something that, you\u2019re always noticing it. I think with a part of the body you need a lot as a hockey player, it\u2019s hard not to focus on that and dwell on it, even coming back and you know it\u2019s healthy.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Unlike players who get hurt in the middle of a season, Duclair had a full summer \u2014 albeit one he\u2019s admitted did not go as planned \u2014 and a full training camp to get right. He wasn\u2019t jumping on a moving train.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cSpeed-wise, I think it\u2019s there,\u201d Duclair said. \u201cDoing everything possible in terms of preparation to be ready for games, practices, stuff like that. I think my skating\u2019s pretty good. Just gotta use it more efficiently at times.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

What exactly does that mean?\u00a0<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\tOn the ice from Long Island\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSign up for Inside the Islanders by Ethan Sears, a weekly Sports+ exclusive.\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\tThank you\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think picking your spots is the word for it,\u201d Palmieri said. \u201cI think giving himself the opportunity to be in open ice and use his speed and his skill is something that, I think as your career goes on, you find yourself more comfortable and maybe not thinking about it as much. But when you miss time like that, the way he had last year, it\u2019s hard to get that timing back.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

One thing here is fairly certain: The fourth line does not seem like a permanent solution.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"NewNew York Islanders\u2019 Anthony Duclair takes a shot during the first period of an NHL hockey game against the Philadelphia Flyers, Saturday, Oct. 25, 2025, in Philadelphia. AP<\/p>\n

Duclair, at his best, plays a game of speed, skill and scoring. There\u2019s little point in having him play the fourth line, as his 9:13 of ice time Friday betrayed.\u00a0<\/p>\n

If he can\u2019t force his way off it, then it\u2019s fair to wonder what comes next.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The idea that Anthony Duclair would walk in this season as if he hadn\u2019t missed a step, put…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":256579,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[151358,64,63,5791,575,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-256578","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-anthony-duclair","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-new-york-islanders","12":"tag-nhl","13":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/256578","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=256578"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/256578\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/256579"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=256578"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=256578"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=256578"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}