This is not the way the Islanders would have liked to welcome John Tortorella.
The former coach of the Rangers will come to the Coliseum Tuesday night, the first time the enigmatic bench admiral has been in the New York area as coach of his new Canucks team since being kicked off Broadway and finding greener pastures in Vancouver.
And although it’s not the struggling Blueshirts whom Tortorella will face — that circus showdown not coming until Nov. 30 at the now revamped Garden — he will instead get the Islanders, suddenly hobbled by the major absences of Michael Grabner and Lubomir Visnovsky.
Grabner, the speedster who had been the team’s best forward through a 3-3-2 start, was suspended for two games on Monday. It was the consequence of his head shot on Hurricane’s forward Nathan Gerbe during the first period of Saturday’s 4-3 loss, a play on which no penalty was called.
“I thought he might cut it to the middle so of course I wanted to try to deny a scoring chance from the hash marks,” Grabner said after Monday’s practice, before his lengthy phone hearing with league disciplinarian Brendan Shanahan. “I tried to come over and help [defenseman Matt Carkner] out, and that’s when I didn’t really have any way to go. I tried to go through his stick and I just collided with him.”
Grabner, who has never been fined or suspended in his five-year career, was also given some slack on the suspension because Gerbe returned and played the whole game. According the Raleigh News & Observer, Gerbe missed Monday’s practice, but coach Kirk Muller said he could be back on Tuesday, with the Hurricanes’ next game Thursday against the Wild in Minnesota.
It was in that same first period on Saturday when Visnovsky, the Islanders top power-play point man and a big minutes-eating defenseman, went down with a concussion. He was hit behind his net by Radek Dvorak, there was no penalty called, and Visnovsky did not return to the game.
Visnovsky was placed on injured reserve retroactive to Saturday, so the first game he could return would be Oct. 29 against the Rangers at the Coliseum — the same game Rangers’ forward Carl Hagelin can return from his offseason shoulder surgery, as well.
“Gerbe got up and went to the bench while Lubo didn’t,” Capuano said about the respective hits, with Dvorak getting no penalty, fine or suspension. “But that’s up to league.”
As for the Canucks, Tortorella brings them in at 5-4-1, with his team adjusting to a new voice behind the bench quite a bit better than the Rangers (2-5-0) have adjusted to Alain Vigneault, the former headman in Vancouver.
“Similar style, for sure,” Capuano said in comparing Tortorella’s Canucks to his vintage Rangers teams. “As a coach, you have to believe in your system, and you have to have trust in your system, and your players have to believe in it. He’s had success doing that.”
Odds are Capuano will insert two rookies to replace Grabner and Visnovsky, with Brock Nelson likely getting in up front and Matt Donovan playing on the blue line.
Nelson, 23, was recalled from AHL Bridgeport after playing one game down there on Sunday night. He has been a healthy scratch for three games in a row, and four of the past five after playing the first three games of the season. Donovan has been scratched three of the past four.