Islanders rally past Maple Leafs for win in overtime

NEW YORK -- Brock Nelson scored his second goal of the game with 2:18 left in overtime to give the New York Islanders a 6-5 win against the Toronto Maple Leafs at Barclays Center on Monday.
Ryan Strome, Nikolay Kulemin, Josh Bailey and Andrew Ladd also scored for New York (23-18-10), which rallied to avoid a third straight loss.
Ladd tied the game with 1:29 left the third period, his fourth goal in the past five games. Thomas Greiss made 27 saves.

WATCH: All Maple Leafs vs. Islanders highlights
"It was tough giving up a late one there, but a good response," Nelson said. "Huge goal by [Ladd] to get us to overtime."
Nikita Soshnikov, Auston Matthews, Mitchell Marner, Zach Hyman and William Nylander, all rookies, scored for Toronto (24-17-10). Andersen made 28 saves.
"I think you're disappointed," Maple Leafs coach Mike Babcock said. "It's always good to get a point on the road. If it was 2-1, I'd probably wouldn't feel like I do right now. When you give up six goals, especially some of the mistakes we made defensively … for me, to give up free ones, just tap-ins by our net, is not good enough. We've got to get that fixed in a hurry."
Strome gave the Islanders a 1-0 lead 1:23 into the game when he put his own rebound in to extend his point streak to four games.
Soshnikov tied it when he took a pass from Nikita Zaitsev and beat Greiss with a slap shot from the slot at 13:27 of the first period.
Matthews put the Maple Leafs in front when his shot from near the top of the crease managed to squeak between Greiss' pads at 14:51 to make it 2-1. It was Matthews' 24th goal.
Kulemin tied it with 1:47 left in the first. Shane Prince passed to Casey Cizikas in the slot, and his wrist shot was stopped by Andersen but Kulemin quickly scored on the rebound to make it 2-2.

Toronto took a 3-2 lead at 5:12 of the second period when Marner took a cross-ice feed from Tyler Bozak and beat Greiss with a wrist shot from the right circle.
Hyman made it 4-2 with his third shorthanded goal of the season at 9:34 when he finished a 2-on-1 from the left circle.
Nelson got the Islanders back within one when he one-timed Strome's pass from behind the net past Andersen to make it 4-3 with 6:12 left in the period.
Bailey tied it 4-4 when Anders Lee redirected Dennis Seidenberg's shot in front and the puck trickled to Bailey for a tap-in with 6:30 remaining.
"We just tried to hang in there and keep playing," said Bailey, who finished with three points. "We knew we were going to have to score a few tonight against this team and found a way to do it.
Nylander gave Toronto a 5-4 lead when he one-timed Rielly's feed past Greiss at 17:59 of the third.
"When you leave points on the board like we did tonight, you make games down the stretch that much more important," Rielly said. "We've got to regroup and get back at it [Tuesday] night."

Goal of the game

Nelson won it for the Islanders when he finished off a 3-on-1 by beating Andersen with a wrist shot from the right circle.

Save of the game

Greiss extended the game when he gobbled up Rielly's shot from point-blank range on a 3-on-1 rush 27 seconds into overtime.

Highlight of the game

The Islanders tied it again and sent the game to overtime when Ladd scored with Greiss pulled for an extra attacker, perfectly redirecting Bailey's feed from the left wing past Andersen after John Tavares won an offensive zone faceoff to make it 5-5.

Unsung performance of the game

Islanders defenseman Calvin de Haan had an assist, blocked four shots and was plus-2 in 21:14 of ice time.

They said it

"We definitely need to be better. These are important points. We're getting down to the stretch end of the season and we don't want these points to come back and haunt us. We've got to make sure we capitalize on them." -- Maple Leafs center Auston Matthews

"Down the stretch, every win's huge. I think especially tonight, the last two games obviously we didn't find a way to get the points we wanted. Tonight, we found a way. You don't want anything to start snowballing, but we keep a pretty even keel in here. We're refocused for every game and we'll do the same tomorrow." -- Islanders forward Josh Bailey

Need to know

Marner has six points (three goals, three assists) during a four-game point streak. … The Islanders moved within three points of the Philadelphia Flyers for the second wild card into the Stanley Cup Playoffs from the Eastern Conference. New York has three games in hand on Philadelphia.

What's next

Maple Leafs: Host the Dallas Stars on Tuesday (7:30 p.m. ET; TSN4, FS-SW+, NHL.TV)
Islanders: At the Philadelphia Flyers on Thursday (7 p.m. ET; NBCSN, TCN-PH, NHL.TV)