After two mistakes that led to goals against, Islanders forward Bo Horvat rose above them to help his team climb out of a hole and take home two points.
New York Islanders forward Bo Horvat was not having a good night against the St. Louis Blues.
After turning the puck over twice in the first half of the second period, Horvat and the Islanders were chasing 2-0 in a game where they were playing quite well.
On the first Blues goal, Horvat tried to be a little too cute inside the St. Louis zone, leading to an odd-man rush the other way:
On the second turnover, Horvat believed he had a tad more time to make a player in front of goaltender Ilya Sorokin before getting his pocket picked:
Horvat and turnovers aren't two things that usually find themselves in the same sentence, but in a game that the Islanders had to have, they were trailing 2-0.
Kyle Palmieri and Jean-Gabriel Pageau erased that 2-0 deficit in a span of 5:15 to tie the score heading into the third period.
Then, just 55 seconds into the third, Horvat went to work, scoring a rather impressive goal to give the Islanders their first lead of the night:
"I don't know if you could tell by my celebration, but I felt like I definitely owed the team that," Horvat said postgame. "Just one of those games where everything I turned over went into the net."
The Islanders added an empty-net goal with 30 seconds to play, with Horvat back on the ice with the game on the line, before the buzzer sounded for the 4-2 win.
Horvat continued to show that accountability postgame.
"Those first two goals were definitely my fault," Horvat said. So I mean, my teammates stepped up big there. Pageau and Palmieri, and that line, were unbelievable tonight against that top line. They had our backs. They definitely had mine, and I'm thankful for that. And I mean, hopefully, I made up for it there in the third."
Horvat was already an accountable player before Patrick Roy walked through the doors, and by being that leader, it's only helped the new bench boss get his message across to the rest of the team.
"[The giveaways], that could have been anyone," Jean-Gabriel Pageau said. "We were kind of trying to find something. It shows how much character he has and how much he wants it. He wanted to go get that goal, and he did. I thought he was one of our top players tonight.”
Defenseman Noah Dobson looks at Horvat as a leader.
“That’s the player he is. He’s a big part of our team," Dobson said. "He leads by example. That was a huge goal to get going in the third for us, so it was nice to see him get rewarded.”
Roy had one word to describe what Horvat's performance said about him.
"Character," Roy said. "I had some tough nights. It didn't mean that we had to lose the game because of it. Sometimes, you just need to find a way to get it back and what Bo did.
"I mean, those two goals weren't just on him. We could have helped him in some situation with one of those two goals, but I mean his character. That's why I saw him in that third period. That's why I put him back on the ice at the end of the game because I knew I could trust him. I knew that he was playing heavy in that third period. He was on a mission. I think he wanted to give back to his teammates and win the game and be the difference maker, and that's exactly what he did in that third period."
Horvat's third-period tally gave him his 24th goal of the season, and he has 29 assists in 60 games. Since arriving, he's been a revelation for the Islanders on and off the ice, and there's a reason general manager Lou Lamoriello wanted to bring him in.
His leadership was clear from day one, and throughout the struggles, that never wavered.
Now, in crunch time, he's helping the Islanders continue their push to the playoffs.