Barry Trotz Was Really Angry About His Team's Late Loss to the Capitals

Barry Trotz was really angry about his team's late loss to the Caps originally appeared on NBC Sports Washington

There are two sides to every game. As incredible as the Capitals' last-minute 3-2 win was on Tuesday, it was not nearly as much fun for Barry Trotz and the New York Islanders.

Despite playing a Caps team without Alex Ovechkin, Evgeny Kuznetsov, Dmitry Orlov, Ilya Samsonov and Tom Wilson, and losing Lars Eller and Nicklas Backstrom during the game, Trotz saw his team walk away from Tuesday's contest without a single point even though the score was tied at 2 entering the final minute of regulation.

"I warned our group about the play of the Caps," Trotz said following the game. "They’re galvanized in terms of rallying around the guys that are out. Obviously with the new people that they have, the staff and some players, they’re playing a systematic, hard-work, detailed game and they’re going the distance on everything. They’re playing hard and fast and give them credit, but at the same time I felt that it’s a missed opportunity for us.

"You’ve got maybe the greatest goal-scorer of all time up in the stands. They had some injuries with Kuznetsov, who is a dynamic player. Backstrom got hit and missed some time. Eller missed a little bit of time, it looked like at the end. They were working. They were coming."

Even more stunning to Trotz was the fact that the team could not get at least a point even after killing off a five-minute major penalty to Leo Komarov in the third period. Komarov was called for an ugly hit from behind to Eller that knocked the Caps' center out of the game.

Trotz expected his team to gain momentum after killing off the penalty, but that did not happen.

"We did a great job killing it off and usually you kill it off, your bench has got some momentum," Trotz said. "We felt like we were going to get a point and not lose a point and hopefully get it in the last shift or two or get it in overtime. It energized our bench and then we backed off and they came down and then scored a goal late. That’s a missed opportunity."

The Islanders eliminated the Caps in the 2020 postseason with ease, defeating Washington in just five games. After a series in which New York was able to do whatever it wanted, Tuesday's game -- the first between these two teams since that playoff series -- was a dramatic shift.

Trotz lamented that his team made life easy for goalie Vitek Vanecke saying, “We didn’t make it difficult, but I give them credit. They blocked a lot of shots. They were committed, too. It’s hard to get pucks through right now. You look at the guys in front trying to block shots from both sides. This is playoff mentality right now and I’m not quite sure we’re in a playoff mentality right now, which is really pissing me off.”

Trotz's fiery comments will add intrigue to Thursday's rematch when these two teams meet again. The head coach likely was talking as much to his team as he was to the media with his comments. We should expect to see a different Islanders team on Thursday both in terms of effort and the lineup.

“We need more," Trotz said. "I just felt we had one line. That’s all I felt like I had tonight and that’s a couple games in a row here, so we’re going to shake it up and put some new people in and go from there.”

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