Accountability is everything under Patrick Roy.
EAST MEADOW, NY -- Before the New York Islanders left the ice on Friday to jump on a flight to Dallas, head coach Patrick Roy called his players in for a chat.
It was hard to hear the entirety of what he was saying, but the topic was accountability and getting the team to understand that if one of them makes a mistake, that doesn't mean that said player is the one to blame for the goal.
"Is it your fault," Roy said as he pointed to Noah Dobson. "Is it your fault," Roy said as he pointed to Mayfield and then a few others.
The answer he was looking for was no.
The blame goes around.
"Turnovers are not just the responsibility of forwards," Roy said following practice. "It's the team's responsibility. If our defense goes out there and they have no options, there's a good chance we're going to turn pucks over.
"When we played the Rangers in our preseason finale, we had 22 turnovers. Last game against Utah, we had 42. There's a reason why we had 42 and 22. It's because we had options against Rangers. Our forwards were quick to give our defense an out.
"Hockey is a team game. So, if we're not responsible as forwards to get open and give our defense some options, then our defense might be left out to dry."
Roy's words don't mean that certain players are off the hook for mistakes they make.
On Utah's tying goal with under two minutes to play, Islanders defenseman Noah Dobson made a mistake that ended up in the back of the net. He allowed Josh Doan to get behind him.
That's something at that stage of the game, after just taking the lead, cannot happen:
"What I love about Noah is he didn't put his head in the sand. He admitted that he should have done a better job," Roy said. "To me, this is very positive because he knows he could have done something different. He could have made a different play and cut that play off. He deserves a lot of credit for it.
"I'm happy to see that response. I mean, there are too many of us in today's world, and sometimes we find excuses for things not happening. And Noah did not make excuses."
Everyone was hoping that the hard work from last season under Roy and then strong training camp and preseason would mean a perfect opening night.
Of course, tempering expectations is always important because, like Roy always says, it is a process.
There were a lot of good things done in the 5-4 overtime loss to Utah.
So, now, it's about taking the positives, learning, and growing from the negatives so that when the puck drops against the Stars in Dallas at 8 PM ET, these same mistakes don't come back to bite them.