In Pittsburgh, the New York Islanders scored twice in the third period to rally for a 3-3 tie with the Penguins on Thursday night.
Brock Nelson completed the rally with a strike in extra time for a 4-3 win.
“We’ve found ourselves in that situation a few times this season, [but] we’ve been able to come out with victories,” Nelson said. “We were able to kind of reset after the second and realize where we’re at isn’t a good spot. We haven’t played our best, so we wanted to come out and turn it up.”
Hudson Fasching a and Anders Lee scored the third period markers for the tie.
Ilya Sorokin made 33 saves in the Isles win.
“You’re going to have a night maybe where you’re a little bit off,” Islanders coach Lane Lambert said. “The key to a good hockey team is to find a way to win a game like that. We did.”
New York improved to 34-25-8.
“We stick with our game,” said Lee. “We play the way we have been, we did it the last 20 [minutes], on our forecheck, our guys can make plays and score goals. Down 3-1, it’s definitely a big task. It’s not going to happen every night, but we believe in ourselves.”
Lee, who had two goals on the night scored off the power play in the first period for a 1-0 lead to the Islanders.
Pittsburgh went off on a three-goal streak to take the lead and seeming control of the game.
Jake Guentzel and Jason Zucker scored in the first period to give the Pens a 2-1 lead headed to the middle frame.
Pittsburgh dropped to 32-22-10.
“It’s tough to swallow. It stings,” Penguins coach Mike Sullivan said. “I feel badly for the players because I thought for the majority of the night, we were the better team.”
Josh Archibald scored midway through the second period for a 3-1 lead to the Pens.
Tristan Jarry made 24 saves in the Penguins loss.
“They played a full 65 [minutes],” Jarry said. “We were able to push the first and second period. I think just a little bit of puck mismanagement in the third period. A couple of bounces went their way.”
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