{"id":282406,"date":"2025-11-13T19:44:08","date_gmt":"2025-11-13T19:44:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/282406\/"},"modified":"2025-11-13T19:44:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-13T19:44:08","slug":"islanders-can-contend-if-gm-mathieu-darche-adds-a-few-pieces","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/282406\/","title":{"rendered":"Islanders can contend if GM Mathieu Darche adds a few pieces"},"content":{"rendered":"

LAS VEGAS \u2013 Mathieu Darche<\/a> rejoined this Islanders\u2019 road trip after a side trek to Toronto for the general managers\u2019 meeting earlier this week. By all accounts, it was a low-key gathering.<\/p>\n

But, perhaps in the quiet moments, Darche had a chance to talk to his fellow GMs and lay some groundwork for future trades.<\/p>\n

Because Darche will need to make a move or two before the March 6 trade deadline.<\/p>\n

The Islanders, 8-6-2 entering Thursday night\u2019s match against Vegas at T-Mobile Arena, are in the middle of a compact and seemingly wide-open Metropolitan Division and Eastern Conference. Add another scoring wing and a solid defenseman and they could be one of the conference\u2019s better teams.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think since Day 1, the GM showed a lot belief in this group,\u201d Jean-Gabriel Pageau told Newsday after Wednesday\u2019s practice. \u201cI believe in every player here. You always hope it\u2019s going to stay like that. Sometimes it\u2019s a bit out of your control. We want to be a successful team. We want to win. We want to win a (Stanley) Cup. If you\u2019re in the mix, you\u2019re looking sometimes for depth in case of injuries. But I fully trust in this group, there\u2019s a lot of depth.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Islanders believe they can win. But they must do something to elevate them from the crowd so Darche, in his first season running the Islanders, must be efficient.<\/p>\n

The opportunity is there.<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, I think everybody is saying this,\u201d said coach Patrick Roy, noting the tight standings. \u201cEverybody believes that it\u2019s open and it\u2019s matter of getting hot and winning some games. That\u2019s why this is an important road trip for us in some ways.\u201d<\/p>\n

Vegas is one of the Western Conference\u2019s better Stanley Cup contenders. Utah, which hosts the Islanders on Friday night, is a playoff contender. Colorado and Dallas, the following two stops, are also strong Cup contenders.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese are awesome games to play, come and get tested,\u201d captain Anders Lee told Newsday. \u201cThese are fun challenges to have at this point of the year to see how we\u2019re doing.\u201d<\/p>\n

More depth may be coming, too, as rookie forward Max Shabanov (upper body), wearing a red, non-contact jersey, rejoined practice and skated with his teammates for the first time since Oct. 21.<\/p>\n

But Shabanov, with one goal and two assists in six games, has not yet proven he can be a consistent NHL producer after being one the past three seasons back home in the KHL.<\/p>\n

The best case for the Islanders is if Shabanov plays among the top six. Currently, Simon Holmstrom is playing that role while skating on Mathew Barzal\u2019s line with Jonathan Drouin. But Holmstrom is better suited for Pageau\u2019s third line with Lee.<\/p>\n

A trade may bring more certainty than Shabanov.<\/p>\n

Defensively, the Islanders could certainly use more depth with the bottom pair of Alexander Romanov and Tony\u00a0DeAngelo going through its struggles. Romanov won\u2019t be out of the lineup unless he gets hurt again \u2013 always a possibility given his physical style \u2013 but DeAngelo\u2019s effectiveness is often limited to his power-play time.<\/p>\n

But there was also another possibility for Darche\u2019s time at the GM meeting. Perhaps, other GMs sought him out to inquire about Lee<\/a> and Pageau\u2019s availability.<\/p>\n

Both are pending unrestricted free agents in their final seasons of their contracts. Pageau\u2019s hometown Senators traded him to the Islanders in 2020 the last time he was in a contract year.<\/p>\n

Both would be nice trade rental acquisitions for a playoff contender.<\/p>\n

It will be a fine line for Darche with the Islanders likely to remain in the playoff chase. He had a strong first offseason as Islanders\u2019 GM<\/a>, signing Drouin and Shabanov as free agents and acquiring Emil Heineman in the Noah Dobson deal with the Canadiens. Heineman has blossomed into a top-six forward this season.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re trending in the right direction here,\u201d Lee said. \u201cThis group believes in that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still, Darche needs to add to this group.<\/p>\n

\"Andrew<\/p>\n

\n\tAndrew Gross joined Newsday in 2018 to cover the Islanders. He began reporting on the NHL in 2003 and has previously covered the Rangers and Devils. Other assignments have included the Jets, St. John\u2019s and MLB.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LAS VEGAS \u2013 Mathieu Darche rejoined this Islanders\u2019 road trip after a side trek to Toronto for the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":282407,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[64,63,5791,575,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-282406","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-new-york-islanders","11":"tag-nhl","12":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/282406","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=282406"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/282406\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/282407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=282406"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=282406"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=282406"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}