With the recent out of the blue firing of Isles head coach Lane Lambert, the Isles switch over from running a defensive scheme, to an offensive scheme. They've hired Patrick Roy as head coach, and here's what Mat Barzal had to say about that:
Even though he obviously can't outwardly be negative about his ex-coach, that's a pretty positive review of his new head coach's system. He says that they are going for «aggressiveness» and that the new fit translated well.
Mat Barzal is the Islanders' lead scorer with 48 points in 45 games. Barzal is an extremely underrated player, having put up more points than games played in his rookie year, and having 410 points in 465 games played.
Barzal could potentially benefit even more under his new coach, and could really impress down the stretch. It's likely to see all prominent Isles players get an offensive bump with the new hiring, and could be sleeper picks to make it far in the playoffs if all goes well.