A Season That Promised More: The Islanders’ 2026 Rise, Collapse, and the Matthew Schaefer Breakout

The New York Islanders skate into their final game of the 2025-26 season tonight against the Carolina Hurricanes at 43-33-5, already eliminated but still carrying one major reason for optimism: rookie defenseman Matthew Schaefer. New York won the 2025 draft lottery, took Schaefer first overall, and immediately hit the jackpot. Entering the finale, Schaefer has 23 goals, 36 assists and 59 points, tying Brian Leetch’s single-season NHL record for goals by a rookie defenseman and already setting franchise marks for an Islanders rookie blueliner in goals and points. At 18, he has not just lived up to the hype, he has completely changed the long-term outlook of the franchise.

For most of the season, the Islanders were one of the NHL’s surprise stories. They sat in playoff position for much of the year, got strong top-end production from Mathew Barzal and Bo Horvat, and stayed afloat because Ilya Sorokin kept delivering the kind of stabilizing goaltending that can cover for a team’s flaws. Barzal rediscovered much of his old playmaking form and enters the last game with 71 points, while Horvat reached 30 goals for the fourth time in his career. Before the late collapse, NHL.com noted that the Islanders had been one of the league’s biggest surprises past the three-quarter mark, with Sorokin among the Vezina-caliber goalies in the conference and Schaefer emerging as the Calder front-runner.

The numbers show why the Islanders hung around so long. Through 81 games, they had scored 228 goals and allowed 234, good for 2.81 goals per game and 2.89 goals against per game. That made them roughly middle-of-the-pack offensively but much better defensively on the whole, with the sixth-fewest goals allowed per game in the league. Their penalty kill was a strength at 80.8 percent, ninth in the NHL, and Sorokin’s seven shutouts led the league entering the final day. Even with the offense sometimes sputtering, they were hard to bury because they defended well enough and got enough saves to stay in games.

But the warning signs were there the whole time. The power play never became trustworthy, and that flaw eventually became fatal. New York enters the finale with a 16.7 percent power play, the third-worst rate in the NHL. Their overall scoring profile also lagged behind true contenders; 2.81 goals per game ranked 15th, which is survivable when the structure is sharp and the goaltending is elite, but dangerous when injuries hit and the margin for error disappears. The Islanders played above their talent level for long stretches, but they were always leaning heavily on Sorokin, close-game execution, and their top players producing at near-best-case levels.

That balancing act finally cracked down the stretch. The Islanders lost nine of their last 13 and were officially eliminated by Sunday’s 4-1 loss to Montreal after also dropping Saturday’s game to Ottawa. In that Canadiens loss, Montreal scored three times in a 55-second span late in the second period, essentially ending the season in one brutal burst. Reuters and team coverage both pointed to the same themes: the Islanders’ late-season collapse came with poor special teams, defensive breakdowns, and a club that simply looked drained. By the time they reached the finish line, the energy, sharpness and confidence that had carried them for months were gone.

The blue line, in particular, became a problem. Schaefer was brilliant, and Ryan Pulock remained important, but once injuries and depth issues piled up, the defense looked stretched thin. NHL.com highlighted that the Islanders allowed 42 high-danger shots over the four games leading into Patrick Roy’s dismissal on April 5, one of the worst marks in the league over that span. That tracks with the eye test of the final few weeks: too many breakdowns, too many coverage issues, and too much being asked of Sorokin. New York’s goaltending and structure could carry them only so far once the back end stopped looking organized.

Sorokin still deserves enormous credit for keeping this season meaningful into mid-April. He enters the finale at 29-24-2 with a 2.68 goals-against average, a .906 save percentage and seven shutouts. Those are good numbers, not superhuman ones, but they undersell how often he papered over the team’s flaws. Team coverage noted that after a rough opening stretch, Sorokin settled in and posted much stronger numbers for most of the season, including a long run in which he was among the NHL leaders in save percentage and shutouts. Without him, this would have looked much more like a lottery season than a playoff chase.

So how should this season be graded? Offensively, the Islanders get a B-. Barzal bounced back as a creator, Horvat scored 30, and Schaefer gave them a star-level weapon from the blue line, but the overall production was too average and the power play too poor for anything higher. Defensively, they get a B. Over the full season they were legitimately strong by goals-against numbers, but the late unraveling and lack of depth keep this from being a higher mark. In goal, they get an A-. Sorokin once again gave them top-tier play, led the league in shutouts entering the final day, and was a major reason this team stayed in the race as long as it did.

This offseason feels straightforward, even if the execution will be difficult. The Islanders need more secondary scoring, a real power-play overhaul, and more speed and reliability on the blue line behind Schaefer. They also need to get younger around their emerging core rather than asking Sorokin, Horvat, and Barzal to drag an older roster through another 82-game grind. The good news is that the hardest piece to find may already be in place. Franchises spend years searching for a true cornerstone defenseman and the Islanders may have found one immediately in Schaefer. That does not erase the disappointment of a season that ended with a thud, but it does mean this year should be remembered as more than a collapse. It was also the year the Islanders found the player who may define everything that comes next.