Just when the New York Islanders got finished with Jeff Carter lighting it up against them with Pittsburgh, they face another significant trade deadline pickup in Taylor Hall and the Boston Bruins.
The Islanders might not even be in the second round if not for a trade to get Kyle Palmieri and Travis Zajac from New Jersey. The Bruins also needed Mike Reilly arguably as much as Hall in the first round after their blue line was hit with injuries.
From Hall and Reilly to Palmieri and Zajac and David Savard with the Tampa Bay Lightning, trade deadline acquisitions big and small are already paying major dividends in the NHL playoffs. As Stanley Cup-winning defenseman Ken Daneyko pointed out, âObviously you hope for this when you make deadline acquisitions.â
âSometimes you try and do too much, sometimes youâre trying not to step on anyoneâs toes,â said Winnipegâs Paul Stastny, who was a deadline addition for the Jets in 2018. âYou were brought in here for a reason, and itâs not to change the game. Sometimes itâs tough because you know some guys might get moved around the lineup a little bit, but you try not to worry about that.â
Daneyko, now an NHL Network analyst, called Hall a âperfect fitâ with the Bruins. Hall, the 2018 Hart Trophy winner as league MVP, scored two goals in five games of the first round against Washington â the same number he had in 37 games with lowly Buffalo before the trade to Boston.
One of those goals tied the score with 2:49 left in Game 2, which showed the Bruins how Hall could perform in important moments after never winning a seven-game series previously in his NHL career.
âA lot of things in life are about adjustments,â Hall said. âIn the playoffs, you have to play hard, you have to play physical, you have to do all those things, but you also have to make plays and you also have to play with calm and composure.â
The Bruins can also play with more confidence thanks to Hall, who gives them secondary skill behind the âPerfection Lineâ of Brad Marchand, Patrice Bergeron and David Pastrnak. Hall has slid in on David Krejciâs left wing perfectly.
âSince they got Taylor Hall itâs really put everybody on the right seat on the bus, I think, for their team,â Islanders coach Barry Trotz said Friday. âIt has given them (a) second line that is a threat, and night in and night out it can be a gamechanger at times for them.â
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Much like Carter was a difference-maker with four goals for the Penguins, Islanders star Mathew Barzal called Hall a âgame-breakerâ New York must keep an eye on. The same goes on the other side for Palmieri, who scored the first-round Game 1 overtime winner and added a key goal in the series clincher.
Zajac, the other player the Islanders got from the Devils for a first-round pick, had been a healthy scratch until an injury opened the door for him to play Game 5 against Pittsburgh. Of course he picked up an assist on the winning goal.
âIf we didnât have a Palmieri or a Zajac, weâd be in one (a hole) a little bit,â Trotz said. âWeâd be getting deep into our depth.â
The Bruins would be in trouble without Reilly after losing defensemen Jeremy Lauzon, Jakub Zboril and Kevan Miller to injury. Reilly called it âsome kind of tough luckâ â but itâs also a playoff lesson that a contender canât have too many defensemen.
The Lightning figured that out on the way to hoisting the Cup last year, filtering players in and out amid injuries. They paid the price of a first-round pick this year to get rugged, big-minute defenseman David Savard from Columbus at the deadline.
Lightning coach Jon Cooper said facing Savard in the playoffs the past two seasons gave them âa firsthand look of him and what he can do.â The same goes for Toronto getting ex-Blue Jackets captain Nick Foligno, whose absence after the first two games against Montreal has hurt.
Savard didnât play a leading role in Tampa Bay getting past Florida. But Daneyko said Savard is âgoing to have a bigger impact as these playoffs go along because of his size, because of his experience.â The Lightning are counting on that in a bid to repeat.
âItâs just one of those things that the more you play with a new group of faces, the better and better you get just because you start to understand guysâ tendencies and understand where theyâre going to be on the ice,â said forward Blake Coleman, who was one of the Lightningâs 2020 deadline pickups. âSavvyâs a guy that we love having in our room and another guy that I expect to get better and better as we go.â
Not every trade worked out as planned: Anthony Mantha was ineffective for the Capitals, and Sam Bennett had as many suspensions as goals for the Panthers. And some deals long before the deadline worked out OK, like Winnipeg adding Pierre-Luc Dubois, who was a big part of a sweep of Edmonton.
âTo try to get to know the systems, watch the team play, I think it was really important to get that time,â Dubois said. âI think it was really helpful for me to be here at that time and not necessarily two, three weeks, a month before the playoffs started.â
Hall of a trade: Deadline acquisitions are difference-makers originally appeared on NBCSports.com