Andrew Gross: Islanders must establish solid home-ice advantage to be in playoff hunt at season's end
Islanders' Bo Horvat during preseason game against the Devils at UBS Arena on Sept. 26, 2026. Credit: Errol Anderson
The Islanders needed to show two things against the Devils on Saturday night as UBS Arena opened its doors for a sixth season.
One was more goal production stemming from more consistent pressure up ice. Because getting that would be a huge boost to the second item.
And that’s establishing a home-ice advantage. That is paramount on the must-see list.
“For sure,” captain Bo Horvat told Newsday. “Having that last change and that home-ice advantage throughout the year is such an important thing for us. If we can get off to a good start at home and be tough to play against in our own rink it’s going to make teams hate to want to come here. I think we have to establish that early in the year.”
Last season, the Islanders went a middling 22-17-2 at home and, not surprisingly, missed the playoffs for a second straight season, costing coach Patrick Roy his job in favor of Pete DeBoer with four games remaining.
DeBoer and his players have detailed his “non-negotiable” list, which includes short shift times and sticking up for teammates in addition to Xs and Os minutiae.
So Newsday asked DeBoer prior to the home opener whether being a hard team to play against at UBS Arena was also a “non-negotiable.”
“Yeah, well, that’s a huge piece of what we’re doing,” DeBoer said. “We want to be a hard team to play against both home and road. But I don’t think it’s any secret if you’re going to be a playoff team, you have to be a good home team. There’s very few teams that get in that don’t establish a home-ice presence. This should be a hard place to play. I think, historically, it always has been. We want to make sure we establish that.”
This marks DeBoer’s first job in the Eastern Conference since the Devils fired him in 2014 so his experience as a road coach at UBS Arena is limited. But he has good reason to believe the building is a tough challenge for opponents. All four of the games DeBoer coached from the visitor’s bench — once with Vegas and three times with Dallas — were one-goal games with three going to overtime. DeBoer’s record: 3-0-1.
That also speaks to the Islanders’ inability to establish an overwhelming home-ice advantage at UBS Arena. Their five-season home record is 107-73-25, which is a .583 points percentage.
In the NHL, that kind of points percentage marks a team as a playoff contender, but not necessarily a playoff qualifier. Typically, teams with point percentages of .600 or higher make the postseason.
The Islanders have done so only twice since winning their last playoff series in 2021 when Nassau Coliseum was still their home rink.
In 2022-23, the Islanders were 25-13-3 at home and 21-10-10 the following season at UBS Arena. Those points percentages were .646 and .634, respectively.
That’s what the Islanders need to establish.
“It’s play hard within our system, the net front, the battles that are 50-50,” Jean-Gabriel Pageau told Newsday. “You want to come out of it with [the puck]. You don’t want to let them run around in your zone and extend the shift to two minutes. We want to end plays quick. We want to be quick in our defensive zone and I think that’s key.”
All that, too, would lead to playing up ice more. Doing so would lead to more goal production. The return of Mathew Barzal (left knee), who did not participate in training camp, will help as well. The team said on Saturday Barzal is expected to start skating on Thursday or Friday.
The Islanders finished 24th in the NHL last season in goals scored with an average of 2.8 per game. They opened this season with a 2-1 loss in Toronto on Wednesday night with Emil Heineman, off Horvat’s feed, scoring shorthanded late in the third period.
Obviously, much more is needed five-on-five and on the power play, which was 0-for-4 with just two shots against the Maple Leafs.
“I thought we did a lot better job defending, for sure, than our last preseason game,” Horvat said of a 4-1 loss to the Devils at UBS Arena on Sept. 26. “But I think we can sustain a lot more offensive-zone pressure. Once we got on the forecheck and turned pucks over, that’s our game and I didn’t think we did enough of that.”
Or, as DeBoer said, “We want to tilt the ice when we play. You can’t do that playing on your heels or backing up.”
That’s the way DeBoer wants to structure his team’s play.
If successful, it will lead to more goal production. And, if that happens, it will lead to more wins at UBS Arena.
That is what the Islanders needed to start to show against the Devils.
Andrew 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’s and MLB.
