Islanders need adjustments in Game 5 to extend East Final vs. Lightning

The Coaches Room is a regular feature throughout the 2019-20 season by former NHL coaches and assistants who turn their critical gaze to the game and explain it through the lens of a teacher. Rob Zettler and Rob Cookson will take turns providing insight throughout the remainder of the Stanley Cup Playoffs.
In this edition, Cookson, a former video coach with the Philadelphia Flyers and former assistant with the Ottawa Senators and Calgary Flames, breaks down Game 4 of the Eastern Conference Final between the Tampa Bay Lightning and New York Islanders, and suggests adjustments each team might make heading into Game 5 at Rogers Place in Edmonton on Tuesday (8 p.m. ET; NBCSN, CBC, SN, TVAS).

Two things have been evident through the first four games of the Eastern Conference Final between the Tampa Bay Lightning and the New York Islanders.
The top players on Tampa Bay are playing like top players. And as good as New York's best players are, they haven't played as well. That's a big reason why the Lightning lead the series 3-1.
RELATED: [Complete Lightning vs. Islanders series coverage]
Tampa Bay is being led by its top line of Nikita Kucherov, Brayden Point and Ondrej Palat.
Kucherov has nine points (two goal, seven assists) in the series and at least one point in each of the four games, including two assists in a 4-1 Lightning win in Game 4 on Sunday. Point, who was unfit to play in Game 3, has seven points (three goals, four assists) in three games, and Palat has four points (three goals, one assist) in four games, including the winning goal Sunday.
Aside from forward Brock Nelson, who has three points (two goals, one assist) in the series, the Islanders' top players have been relatively quiet.
Center Mathew Barzal has two assists and is not driving his line with Anders Lee and Jordan Eberle at the same rate he was earlier in the postseason.
Eberle had a goal and an assist in New York's 8-2 loss in Game 1 but has no points since then. And Lee's only points in the series were two assists in Game 1.
The focus for the Islanders heading into Game 5, should be, "Let's get through five-minute segments of the game." If the big picture is overwhelming, they need to break it into smaller segments. Maybe that gives them a little bit of focus as to what they need to do, including how best to defend against the Lightning's top line.
Point's status for Game 5 is unknown after he might have been injured again during the third period of Game 4. That would, obviously, make a big difference.
The Islanders don't seem to want to match lines, but it appears the Lightning want to get Point's line on the ice against Barzal's line, which hasn't worked out well for New York so far.

Barzal has a minus-5 rating in the series, and Lee and Eberle each is a minus-3. Minus numbers like that are telling about the inability of those players to play on both sides of the puck, especially in a short series like this.
This might be an opportunity for the Islanders to adjust their line combinations.
It's about how can you subtly change the lineup to either get the chemistry or create new chemistry? Or how can you change the mindset of the players to believing that you're close and it's just a matter of adjusting a couple of things in the game plan?
In the Islanders' previous three series, the power play helped the offense by scoring 10 goals. But after scoring on its first chance in Game 1 against Tampa Bay, New York is 0-for-13 with the man-advantage.
Looking at the Islanders' goals-against during the Stanley Cup Playoffs, they have been susceptible to traffic around the net on point shots, and rush plays. The Lightning scored their first three goals Sunday on breakdowns off the rush.
On the first goal, which tied the game 1-1 at 11:42 of the second period, there's no way Yanni Gourde should be able to flip the puck from below the goal line past five players, allowing Blake Coleman to score on a breakaway.

On Palat's goal, which came 12 seconds after Coleman's, at 11:54 of the second, the Islanders basically doubled up on the puck carrier and left Palat wide open. Those plays shouldn't happen.
The Islanders had another breakdown off the rush in the third period when Point scored at 3:33 to make it 3-1.
It's difficult because Tampa Bay plays a long game on its exits out of the defensive zone. The Lightning flip pucks and they pass pucks out of the zone. They don't often make the first pass within the defensive zone.
When forechecking against their defensemen a team needs to focus on a couple of areas. One, the pressure on the defensemen must have an emphasis on denying passing lanes with good sticks and forcing turnovers. Two, positioning the third forward higher above the circles to support the defense.
We used to talk about that with the Ottawa Senators and we had good success in limiting a lot of the Lightning's rush opportunities.
Teams have different philosophies as to how they sort off the rush with back-checker responsibility and defense decisions when the puck is carried out of the offensive zone into the neutral zone. Decisions made early avoid doubling up on either the puck carrier or support and can deny the clean plays that Tampa Bay has had in the series thus far.
Right now the Lightning are playing a better Islanders game than the Islanders are. They're checking better and they're playing harder.
From the Lightning's perspective, they can't relax. With the experience they've acquired over the years and the coaching staff, I don't think they will.
They have to continue to exploit what they're good at: their ability to get pucks out of their zone and into the attack. All the strengths of their game, their offensive zone play, their details of how they get out of their zone, have been really good.
And for the most part they've really been able to check the Islanders' top players.
That's what they should keep focusing on.
The Lightning eliminated the Columbus Blue Jackets in Game 5 in the first round and the Boston Bruins in Game 5 in the second round, and they need to have the same focus in Game 5 against the Islanders to finish this series.