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Islanders fire head coach Scott Gordon, promote AHL coach Jack Capuano on interim basis

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While the Islanders started off the year successfully, things have gone downhill of late and fast. With the team currently mired in a ten-game losing streak something had to give, and it turns out that it was head coach Scott Gordon would have to be the guy to take the fall. This morning, the Islanders fired Gordon as coach of the Islanders. Gordon will stay with the organization as an adviser. Meanwhile, the Islanders have brought on Jack Capuano, head coach of their AHL affiliate in Bridgeport, to fill in on an interim basis.

It may not seem right, but when a team is locked in a streak where they’ve gone 0-9-1 in their last ten games and have had both suspect goaltending and virtually no offense to show for it, Gordon was the guy that would be made an example out of. The key injuries the team has dealt with to Kyle Okposo and Mark Streit couldn’t be used as excuses any longer. While the Islanders had been competitive in their losses recently with many one and two-goal losses, their 5-1 thumping at the hands of the Kings on Saturday night was the last straw.

During their 10-game streak, the team has scored just 14 goals and have been shutout just once. Meanwhile, defensively they’ve allowed 39 goals over that span. It’s tough to be hard on goaltender Dwayne Roloson who has, at times, played spectacularly but the team is missing a lot on defense and both Roloson and highly-struggling Rick DiPietro have suffered because of it. Not having Okposo and Streit, while also having Josh Bailey’s scoring completely disappear, have helped kill the Isles’ ability to score goals and stay in games.

One thing Scott Gordon couldn’t help, however, is the team he was given to coach. The Islanders were a thin team to start the year and the handful of injuries they’ve had to deal with this year exposed this horribly. Without Streit, Milan Jurcina, and Andrew MacDonald the Isles defense is a mess. Then again, you could say they were a mess already when having to rely on guys like that to try and become a playoff team. Gordon ends up paying the ultimate price for the failings of Garth Snow and Charles Wang to spend wisely to get better talent on the Island.

If this is the shakeup the Isles needed to get right, then that’s great. Jack Capuano hasn’t been doing so hot in the AHL however and with him coming in and bringing a similar system to play with, it’s tough to see how things get better any time soon for the Isles. The best medicine in the meantime for the Isles might come on Wednesday when they play a struggling Lightning team back at Nassau Coliseum.