Greetings, fellow Islanders hockey serenaders! Hope you had a restful break. I always enter this late-December stretch eagerly anticipating some days off and thinking I’ll get to recharge after a hectic year. But inevitably I forget how this instinct overlooks all the cooking, child-wrangling, schedule-imploding, drinking, and overeating that comes with trying to see every family member and every friend possible in a very short amount of time.
Tonight the NHL returns from its brief Christmas break — a period where the NFL apparently plays 73 games, I learned during my various family visits over the weekend — and the Islanders are one of 28 teams in action tonight as they host the Pittsburgh Penguins for these teams’ first meeting of the year.