NY Islanders Coaching Change Paying off on Defense

The New York Islanders surprised a lot of people when they fired head coach Patrick Roy with four games remaining in the 2025-26 regular season.

Alas, the higher-ups believed it was the right move if the team was going to move beyond being overachievers and become a legitimate playoff team. In his place, they hired Peter DeBoer, who has a track record of turning teams around immediately.

One of the reasons the move was made at the time was that the Islanders wanted to get out ahead of other franchises that would be seeking a new head coach. Giving him four games at the end of the season would allow DeBoer to acclimate himself to the franchise and see what he needed to implement over the summer.

On the ice, his scheme is what New York needed. Defensive structure was not always sound under Roy, and that is something DeBoer would provide. He pointed out the Islanders had too many mistakes handling the puck, creating scoring chances for opponents.

Islanders defense has been elite to start the season

It was something he was going to emphasize improving, and through the early portion of the season, his scheme has worked. As shared by Tyler Millen of NHL.com, New York has been a force on the defensive end of the ice.

Through eight games, with a 4-3-1 record, the Islanders have allowed only 17 goals, which is the fewest in the Eastern Conference and second fewest in the League. Only the Dallas Stars have allowed fewer, with 12.

Those 17 goals are the fewest the team has allowed through the first eight games of a season since 2001, which doesn’t count the shootout winner by the Ottawa Senators last week.

The head coach gives credit to the coaches on his staff and players for buying in right from the start and seeing the results pour in as a result.

“From day one at training camp we had buy-in,” DeBoer said. “It's been a process, it's not seamless, and there's still areas of improvement that we've got to clean up for sure. I like the fact that we're getting rewarded for that buy-in because from a coaching perspective, that's an important part that the guys see that we're getting results from what they're doing, which hopefully, snowballs and creates more buy-in.”

New York is excelling everywhere defensively. It is currently third in the NHL with 2.13 goals allowed per game, and its penalty kill has been excellent at 86.7%, which is sixth-best in the League.

Two goals or fewer have been allowed in six of their eight games. The nine goals allowed in 5-on-5 play are the second fewest in the League as well.

With such a strong defensive structure in place, the focus will now shift to the offense. A little bit more on that end of the ice would have given the Islanders at least another win or two this season.