The Islanders by no means are expecting the defending Stanley Cup champions to just roll over in this series, especially not in front of their home crowd. The Islanders are instead anticipating a heavy push from the Bolts as they look to even the series in Game 2 and better execute their own style of play.
"What you find in a series, is when you win a game the desperation level on the other side goes up," Trotz said. "You don't want ours to go down. You want to see if we can find another level of resilience, desperation isn't the right word but another level of bite where you can say, 'Yeah OK you can go ahead and raise your level, but we're going to raise ours here.' That's what you try and look for and try and replicate.
It's not as easy as it sounds, but if you can push them out of their game a little bit more and push the momentum than it can be effective."
While the Islanders are confident in playing their own brand of hockey, they know it'll be a challenge. They also know they can further improve their own game. Game 1, while solid, wasn't perfect. The group went 0-for-3 on the power play and 1-for-2 against Tampa's potent power play that robbed Varlamov of his shutout in the final minute of the game.
The Islanders also understand the series isn't decided after a win in Game 1 nor whatever result unfolds in Game 2, but each game is its own event and is an opportunity for the group to better themselves individually and as a full unit.
Plus, the farther the journey into the Stanley Cup Playoffs the higher the stakes and magnitude of each game, each period and each individual shift become.
"Our game has just continued to get better as its gone along," Jordan Eberle said. "That's what you want out of your crew. We still think there's pieces that we can continue to build on, but you're one of the final four and you should have confidence. This is obviously a good start for us, but we know that they're going to come out pushing next game. It just gets harder and harder so we have to be ready."
