Sillingerâs

The New York Islanders
GET TO THE GAME: Sillinger's 1000th! Tampa Bay at Islanders - Thursday at
7:05 pm


GET TO THE GAME: Sillinger's 1000th! Tampa Bay at Islanders - Thursday at
7:05 pm Mike Sillinger's 1000th NHL Game; Tickets 40% off, starting at just
$16

THE REASON TO GO

A night to honor the 1000th NHL game of Mike Sillinger - one of the
classiest guys in the NHL.

GREAT DEAL!

40% OFF!: Tickets for Mike Sillinger's 1000th NHL game on Thursday can be
purchased at up to 40% off regular prices ? starting as low as $16 ?
through Ticketmaster.com and at the Nassau Coliseum box office. The box
office will be open on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday from 9:30 am - 4:45 pm
and on game night Thursday from 9:30 am through the start of the game.

THE STORY Islanders (5-4-0) vs. Tampa Bay Lightning (5-3-1)

The Islanders take on their second Southeast Division team in less than a
week, when they face the Tampa Bay Lightning. Following a two-game winning
streak, the Islanders dropped an 8-3 decision against the
Southeast-division leading Carolina Hurricanes on Saturday, and now
match-up against the second-best team in the Southeast.

Two of the Islanders' three goals on Saturday came on the power play that
went 2-for-5 on the evening, keeping the team second in the league with the
man-advantage. The second power play tally was scored by Mike Sillinger,
who registered his first goal of the season.

It was only fitting that Sillinger scored in the final minute, as a segue
into his 1000th NHL game, which he is set to play on Thursday.

Tampa Bay has earned points in three of their past four games, losing in
overtime to Buffalo on Saturday. They face-off against the Rangers, tonight
at Madison Square Garden and then on Wednesday in New Jersey against the
Devils. The Lightning have the rare opportunity of taking on the three
Metro New York teams in consecutive games. Just over a year ago, the
Florida Panthers played all three Metro teams in a row. A week earlier, the
Nashville Predators swept the three teams in succession. The last time a
team did not register a point against the New York teams in consecutive
games was Florida back in 2001.

It's time for payback To say the Lightning have the Islanders' number
recently would be an understatement. Tampa Bay has won the past eight
meetings, including every game played since the 2004-05 lockout. The last
time the Islanders defeated the Lightning was less than four months prior
to Tampa Bay winning the Stanley Cup.

However, the games last season were all one-goal games, minus the 5-1 loss
on November 6 at the Nassau Coliseum. The two road games each ended in a
shootout, but the Islanders could not muster a win. Three of the four games
featured a Rick DiPietro-Johan Holmqvist matchup.

DiPietro vs. Lightning Rick DiPietro comes into Thursday night's action
sporting a 2-5-0 record in 11 career games vs. the Tampa Bay Lightning.
DiPietro has a 2.82 goals against average and has given up 29 total goals
in his career against the Lightning. One of his two wins was a shutout
(3/31/04 at NYI). In 2006-07, DiPietro went 0-1-2 vs. Tampa Bay, allowing a
total of 11 goals in three games.

Holmqvist vs. Islanders Johan Holmqvist will take the ice on Thursday night
with a 4-0-0 career mark against the Islanders in four games played. Over
this span, Holmqvist has a 2.20 goals against average, allowing nine total
goals. All four wins for Holmqvist came during the 2006-07 season.

THE LINEUPS (potential lines and D pairings)

Islanders Goaltenders 39 Rick DiPietro 34 Wade Dubielewicz

Defensemen 32 Brendan Witt - 24 Radek Martinek 25 Andy Sutton - 47
Marc-Andre Bergeron 14 Chris Campoli - 8 Bruno Gervais

Forwards 26 Ruslan Fedotenko - 89 Mike Comrie - 7 Trent Hunter 11 Andy
Hilbert - 18 Mike Sillinger - 13 Bill Guerin 20 Sean Bergenheim - 63 Josef
Vasicek - 81 Miroslav Satan 12 Chris Simon - 10 Richard Park - 2 Aaron
Johnson 17 Shawn Bates

Tampa Bay Goaltenders 40 Johan Holmqvist 30 Marc Denis

Defensemen 54 Paul Ranger - 71 Filip Kuba 39 Mike Lundin - 55 Shane O'Brien
3 Doug Janik - 37 Brad Lukowich

Forwards 20 Vaclav Prospal - 4 Vincent Lecavalier - 26 Martin St. Louis 17
Jan Hlavac - 19 Brad Richards - 16 Jason Ward 7 Michel Ouellet - 77 Chris
Gratton - 21 Mathieu Darche 74 Nick Tarnasky - 29 Craig MacDonald - 36
Andre Roy

Crucial Matchup: PP vs. PK The Islanders and Lightning each sport two of the
top five power plays in the league. The Islanders rank second, scoring at a
rate of 28.6%, while Tampa Bay is fourth with a percentage of 22.5.

Over the past three games, the Islanders have scored seven power play goals.
Three of those goals have been scored by Bill Guerin, while the other four
were by different players. Chris Campoli leads the team with six power play
assists ? all registered in the past three games.

Tampa Bay has been nearly as good recently, tallying five power play goals
over the past four games. Vaclav Prospal has played finisher, with four
man-advantage goals, while Brad Richards and Martin St. Louis have each
set-up four power play goals.

SUBPLOTS

Mike Sillinger set to play game #1000 During his 17-year career, Mike
Sillinger has played for 12 different teams while collecting 225 goals, 298
assists and 523 points. Sillinger has been a member of the Islanders
organization since the start of the 2006-07 season and has accumulated 27
goals, 35 assists and 62 points in 91 games. He has yet to miss a spot in
the lineup since coming to the Islanders, appearing in 82 games in 2006-07
and the first nine games of 2007-08.

Appearing in 999 career games, below is a breakdown of Sillinger's career
regular season numbers with each of the 12 teams he played for:

TEAM GP G A PTS
DET Totals 129 14 45 59
ANA Totals 77 15 26 41
VAN Totals 138 28 32 60
PHI Totals 52 11 14 25
TB Totals 121 27 27 54
FLA Totals 68 17 25 42
OTT Totals 13 3 4 7
CBJ Totals 155 38 8 86
PHO Totals 60 8 6 14
STL Totals 64 27 24 51
NSH Totals 31 10 12 22
NYI Totals 91 27 35 62
NHL Totals 999 225 298 523

When Sillinger plays his 1000th NHL game on Thursday night at the Coliseum,
he will become just the sixth Islander to wear the Blue and Orange when
reaching the milestone, joining Keith Acton, Butch Goring, Denis Potvin,
Bryan Trottier and Ed Westfall. Of those six, only Potvin and Trottier
played all 1,000 games with the Islanders.

MIKE SILLINGER CAREER MILESTONES:

1st NHL Goal: - 10/25/92 at Chicago 1st NHL Assist/Point: - 10/7/90 at
Philadelphia 500th NHL Point: - 12/3/07 at Montreal Most Goals/Game: - 2
(22 times); last on 3/17/07 at Florida Most Assists/Game: - 4 on 3/18/06
vs. Calgary Most Point/Game: - 5 on 3/17/07 at Florida Most PIM/Game: - 15
on 12/26/05 vs. Dallas


--
// Jerry Heyman | "Software is the difference between
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