LOS ANGELES — This was bad luck on a bad night, a mess of a road trip coming to an unceremonious end as the Islanders’ season continues to slowly slide toward the cliff’s edge.
Damning with faint praise as it is to say, the Islanders played their best hockey of this three-game road trip on Tuesday night.
They suffered a disastrous 4-1 loss to the Kings at Crypto.com Arena anyway, with two goaltender interference calls going against the Isles, resulting in a staggering 0-for-8 power play with two shorthanded goals against, one of which came after Tony DeAngelo’s stick exploded.
“Obviously,” Noah Dobson told The Post, “the hockey gods weren’t on our side tonight.”
It was bad luck, but it was far from a great performance from the Islanders.
And, for a second time on this trip, the Islanders fumbled a chance to get within three points of a playoff spot.
Though their competition in the East’s wild-card race is not exactly covering itself in glory, the Islanders need to make up ground and failed this week at a golden opportunity to do just that.
It is a much tougher task getting into the playoffs this time than at similar junctures the last two seasons, but even the effort the Isles put forth in Los Angeles — while far better than two nights prior in Anaheim — wasn’t what you would call inspiring.
What made just as big a difference than anything on the ice, though, was the Kings’ video staff, which successfully challenged not one, but two apparent Islanders goals in the second period for goaltender interference.
The first one looked open-and-shut, with Simon Holmstrom clearly moving Darcy Kuemper out of the crease to create an opportunity for Anthony Duclair to jam the puck in.
The second, on Anders Lee, was closer to a 50/50 call, with Lee’s skate in the crease and touching Kuemper, but not seeming to affect him on the same player’s backhand goal.
So instead of going into the second intermission tied at three, the Islanders faced a 3-1 deficit — with Quinton Byfield scoring shorthanded after DeAngelo’s stick broke receiving a pass, giving Byfield a breakaway which he easily buried.
Coach Patrick Roy cited the rule book afterward in saying Duclair’s goal, at least, should have counted.
“They go by Rule 69.1, but if you look in the rule book, 69.7, saying if you take a shot on net and there’s a rebound, it should be incidental contact,” Roy said. “In my opinion, that should have been a goal.”
Indeed, Rule 69.7 states that, “In a rebound situation … incidental contact with the goalkeeper will be permitted and any goal that is scored as a result thereof will be allowed.”
Regarding Lee’s disallowed goal, Roy did not take issue, though Lee himself did.
“I always understood the rule to be the contact [has to] inhibit the goalie to make the save,” Lee said. “I don’t think that contact was the reason why he didn’t make the save.”
Bad breaks do not erase this loss, or the six other power plays where the Islanders did not have goals reversed upon review — including a five-on-three.
But it must be said this game had as many bad breaks as the Islanders have suffered all season, and per team statistician Eric Hornick, it was the first time the Isles have ever had two goals called back in a game due to challenges.
Adding injury to insult, the Islanders also lost Adam Boqvist in the second period, with the defenseman leaving the game after taking a hard shoulder check from Kevin Fiala.
There was no update on his status afterward.
Making matters even worse on the power play, the Islanders failed to convert a minute-long five-on-three in the third period, bringing their account to a staggering 0-for-7 with a shorthanded goal allowed on the power play for the evening, with an eighth still to come.
On that eighth, Drew Doughty scored into an empty net for the Kings’ second shorthanded goal of the evening.
Even caveating for the overturned goals, there’s no excusing away a night where the Islanders spent over a fourth of the game on the power play and failed to score on the man advantage.
The Islanders can thank the teams surrounding them in the standings for not taking the opportunity to put them away for good in the playoff race this week.
Even if the standings still say they’re in it, though, this has all the feeling of a season slipping away in slow motion.
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