Matt Niskanen is usually a pretty steady player who doesn’t look for big hits. But when he does look to lower the boom, boy is it brutal.
Late in the second period of game six, former Capital Mikhail Grabovski tried to carry the puck behind Braden Holtby‘s net. Instead, he was crushed with a beautiful shoulder-to-shoulder hit by Niskanen.
Grabovski, who returned Thursday after missing 27 games because of a concussion, was okay.
That wasn’t the only havoc that Niskanen created. Later, he combined with Marcus Johansson and Jason Chimera to frustrate Matt Donovan into taking a misconduct.
The Islanders were down to five defenseman for the first half of the third period.
