Varlamov is believed to be the only player in NHL history to successfully restart his playing career after having double partial knee replacement surgeries. He said last month he mentally was not ready to retire even though he knew the risk he was taking trying to come back.<\/p>\n
“You ask everyone and they had the same feeling, he gave that vibe that, \u2018I’m going to do it, I’ll be the first one in history to ever do it,\u2019” Islanders center Jean-Gabriel Pageau<\/a>\u00a0said after the morning skate. “I think we all felt it. It’s a hard feeling to explain, but to see the commitment and the determination that he had in his eyes, it was fun to watch. It was fun to be part of that journey, and we’re happy now that he’s healthy and he’s ready to roll.”<\/p>\n Varlamov’s comeback became more of a possibility last season, when he played two games in April with Bridgeport of the American Hockey League. He won both, allowing a total of three goals (.939 save percentage).<\/p>\n He then proved to the Islanders that he was ready to return to the NHL during training camp. He played twice in the preseason, including one here against the Rangers on Sept. 22, when he made 10 saves in relief of Ilya Sorokin<\/a>.<\/p>\n “I think it’s going to be awesome,” Islanders captain Bo Horvat<\/a>\u00a0said. “‘Varly’, for him to go through what he went through and come back from having both knees done, yeah, it’s a phenomenal story and obviously we really want to get this one for him tonight.”<\/p>\n Varlamov is making his return in a place he’s experienced a great deal of success in his career.<\/p>\n He is 10-3-1 with a 2.29 goals-against average, .928 save percentage and four shutouts in 14 games at Madison Square Garden, including 5-1-0 with a 1.55\u00a0GAA in six games with the Islanders. His four shutouts here have all been with them.<\/p>\n Islanders coach Peter DeBoer said Varlamov’s history in the Rangers’ home didn’t factor into his decision to have him make his NHL return here in the Islanders’ third game of the season. Sorokin started the first two games for the Islanders (1-1-0), including a 6-0 win against the New Jersey Devils on Saturday, when he made 37 saves.<\/p>\n “He played really well in preseason, he’s ready to go,” DeBoer said. “I don’t want to overplay (Sorokin) so I want to get him in there, and I also don’t want to have him sit for two or three weeks with what he’s gone through and be really cold going in there. There’s a fine line there.<\/p>\n \u201cI mean, there is no perfect spot, but I’m very confident in where he’s at and the kind of game he’s going to give us.”<\/p>\n DeBoer said he’s hopeful the Islanders can have one of the League’s best goalie tandems with Sorokin and Varlamov.<\/p>\n “I really believe with what I saw in Varly that we have two very good goalies,” DeBoer said. “If Varly plays the way I feel he’s going to play as the season goes on, whether it’s tonight or as the season goes forward, I think we’re going to be comfortable playing both guys in whatever building we’re in, in whatever divisional game we’re in, which is a great luxury to have. That’s my vision, and I think why not jump into that early?”<\/p>\n Varlamov is 289-232-71 with a 2.65 GAA, .916 save percentage and 41 shutouts in 621 regular-season games (593 starts) with the Washington Capitals, Colorado Avalanche and the Islanders since entering the League in 2008.\u00a0<\/p>\n He is 32-30 with a 2.44 GAA, .918 save percentage and four shutouts in 65 Stanley Cup Playoff games (62 starts), including helping the Islanders make consecutive trips to the third round (2020, 2021).<\/p>\n “When you look at it over the whole course of how many days it was, I think everything he did was a steppingstone to get back to where we are today, to be putting on the pads, to be back on this team and getting back in net,” forward Kyle Palmieri<\/a>\u00a0said. “I think it’s pretty incredible.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Varlamov is believed to be the only player in NHL history to successfully restart his playing career after…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":873084,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[385,99],"class_list":["post-873083","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/873083","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=873083"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/873083\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/873084"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=873083"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=873083"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=873083"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}