{"id":579548,"date":"2026-04-03T12:13:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-03T12:13:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/579548\/"},"modified":"2026-04-03T12:13:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-03T12:13:10","slug":"will-islanders-schaefer-make-history-tonight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/579548\/","title":{"rendered":"Will Islanders\u2019 Schaefer make history tonight?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg\">Welcome to the home stretch of the 2025-26 NHL season. This deep into the schedule, something significant is on the line virtually every day, whether it\u2019s a playoff spot, division title to clinch or a major individual milestone. At Daily Faceoff, we\u2019re breaking down what you need to know every day between now and the end of the season April 16.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg\">So what\u2019s at stake across the two-game slate for Friday, April 3?<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg\">\u2013 There are no clinching scenarios in play for the <a class=\"text-secondary underline underline-offset-2\" hreflang=\"en\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dailyfaceoff.com\/teams\/philadelphia-flyers\/line-combinations\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Philadelphia Flyers<\/a> (37-26-12) and <a class=\"text-secondary underline underline-offset-2\" hreflang=\"en\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dailyfaceoff.com\/teams\/new-york-islanders\/line-combinations\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">New York Islanders<\/a> (42-29-5) when they meet in Long Island. But the matchup is crucial; the Flyers trail the Isles by just three points for third place in the Metropolitan Division. The result can also affect one idle team in the Eastern Conference playoff race; an Isles win will push the Florida Panthers to the brink of elimination before Saturday\u2019s packed slate of games.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg\">\u2013 \u00a0The Isles\u2019 sensational 18-year-old Matthew Schaefer is a Calder Trophy shoo-in and, with his stat line of 22-35-57 through 76 games, needs one goal to tie Brian Leetch for the single-season NHL rookie record among defensemen at 23 goals. Schaefer can also tie Phil Housley for the most points by an 18-year-old defenseman in NHL history (though the \u201crecord\u201d is pretty specific; Housley had 66 points in his rookie year but technically had 57 before turning 19 in March of that season).<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg\">\u2013 The <a class=\"text-secondary underline underline-offset-2\" hreflang=\"en\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dailyfaceoff.com\/teams\/anaheim-ducks\/line-combinations\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Anaheim Ducks<\/a> (41-29-5) host the <a class=\"text-secondary underline underline-offset-2\" hreflang=\"en\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dailyfaceoff.com\/teams\/st-louis-blues\/line-combinations\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">St. Louis Blues<\/a> (31-31-12) in a matchup with important implications in the Western Conference playoff picture but not one that puts any specific clinching scenario in play. That said: the Ducks are currently tied with the Edmonton Oilers for first in the Pacific Division, while the Blues have fallen five points back of the surging San Jose Sharks in pursuit of the final Wildcard spot. The stakes are plenty high for this game.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg\">_____<\/p>\n<p>PRESENTED BY STAKE<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"text-secondary underline underline-offset-2\" href=\"https:\/\/stake.com\/?c=CQvzzR7n&amp;offer=nhl200&amp;utm_source=dailyfaceoff&amp;utm_medium=cpc&amp;utm_campaign=cf_dir_ca_display&amp;utm_term=display&amp;utm_content=nhl\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" hreflang=\"en\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Stake-Sports-Generic-2_GIF_Version_3-727x404-px.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"w-full\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Welcome to the home stretch of the 2025-26 NHL season. This deep into the schedule, something significant is&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":579549,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[433],"tags":[49,48,448,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-579548","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-nhl","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579548","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=579548"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579548\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/579549"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=579548"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=579548"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=579548"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}