How a 23 win team that is in the midst of a 5 game losing streak can still be in great playoff positioning on February 3rd is beyond my realm of belief.  So it goes in the “New NHL.”  I’ve always been against “loser points” that award a team that loses in overtime a point in the standings, as well as losing in a shoot-out (skills-competition).  I’m sorry, this isn’t kindergarten . . . you shouldn’t get anything for losing in a professional sport (except an earful from the coaching staff).  However, as an Islander fan, it is the loser point that has actually given this team some hope early on in their rebuild process (for those that think Tavares was anything close to the final piece, get real – the rebuilding is far from done).  Besides the loser point, however, and maybe more importantly, is that the teams directly around the Islanders in the Eastern Conference standings simply aren’t that good (that’s right, I’m talking about YOU New York Rangers!  YOU SUCK!).

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But suddenly I’m not as excited as I’ve been.

I Just wanted to say that I’m showing a friend Kansas City for a couple days, so I haven’t been able to write much – but in the following days I will have my take on the Islanders Kings game tonight at the Sprint Center.  I will talk about the suspension of Pascal Morency, who the NHL suspended even after allegedly (I read it somewhere quickly, have to do some fact checking -haven’t had much time for anything) stating the line change was okay, and that he didn’t illegally jump off the bench (so what’s the problem?!)  – so a few posts should be coming up on here tomorrow.

On a more positive note – there will be an upcoming post about BBQ joints in Kansas City, and my quest to eat at as many of the “13 places to eat before you die” list created by Anthony Bourdain.  So far, I have two.

Bottom Line: I’m not as excited for tonight’s game because there’s no Tavares, or many other players I hoped to see.  The building is expected to be very empty, and even though I somewhat expected that, it’s still kind of disappointing.  I just have to ignore the overall mess that is the Islanders’ status (Lighthouse, moving away from NY, etc.) and go enjoy myself at the game – and look out for more posts coming your way tomorrow.