{"id":347222,"date":"2025-11-01T05:01:18","date_gmt":"2025-11-01T05:01:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/347222\/"},"modified":"2025-11-01T05:01:18","modified_gmt":"2025-11-01T05:01:18","slug":"islanders-mat-barzal-explains-issue-that-led-to-getting-scratched","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/347222\/","title":{"rendered":"Islanders’ Mat Barzal explains ‘issue’ that led to getting scratched"},"content":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON \u2014 Mat Barzal explained his tardiness that led to a healthy scratch Thursday night as an \u201calarm clock issue\u201d on Friday before returning to the Islanders\u2019 lineup against the Capitals.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a set bus time in the morning, and I wasn\u2019t on it,\u201d Barzal said prior to a 3-1 victory<\/a> in which he had an empty-net goal. \u201cI was there for the meetings and everything but Mathieu [Darche] at the start of camp made clear that punctuality was a big thing. He wants to set a culture here, as do all the players here. So, unfortunately, I was the first guy to have an alarm clock issue.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Barzal, this was the first time he had overslept.<\/p>\n

The Islanders making an example of the star center was similar to the Lightning \u2014 for whom Darche worked previously as an assistant GM \u2014 doing the same last season when Brayden Point missed a team meeting.<\/p>\n

Without Barzal, the Islanders lost to the Hurricanes 6-2<\/a>, and were forced to play a makeshift lineup with 11 forwards and seven defensemen. They did not have an extra forward on the road and despite attempting to call up top prospect Cal Ritchie, his flight out of New York was canceled due to weather.<\/p>\n

\"MathewMathew Barzal of the New York Islanders skates against the Boston Bruins at the TD Garden on Oct. 28, 2025 in Boston, Massachusetts. NHLI via Getty Images<\/p>\n

Ritchie was called up Friday<\/a> and in the lineup against the Capitals.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was a ton of dialogue,\u201d Barzal said. \u201cNo hard feelings from both sides, it is what it is. Like I said, unfortunately, I was the culprit of an alarm clock issue.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt obviously killed me not playing. It\u2019s funny, when I was younger, when I was 8-10 years old, if I did something wrong, my dad wouldn\u2019t take away my Xbox or PS4. He wouldn\u2019t let me shoot pucks in the garage.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\u201cNot playing yesterday was super tough. It is what it is. We move on and have a good one tonight.\u201d<\/p>\n

Barzal added that there was no need to address the incident with the team.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe best thing about [coach] Patrick [Roy] and Mathieu and management that I\u2019ve had here for my whole career is you wake up the next day and you come to work,\u201d he said. \u201cYou do what you\u2019re expected to do. No carry-over from anybody.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"MathewMat Barzal was scratched during Thursday\u2019s Islanders loss. Getty Images<\/p>\n

Roy said he was unsure whether the Islanders would keep Barzal on Bo Horvat\u2019s wing after using the two together for the first time this season in the third period.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\tOn the ice from Long Island\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSign up for Inside the Islanders by Ethan Sears, a weekly Sports+ exclusive.\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\tThank you\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

After the Capitals lost a challenge to overturn Jean-Gabriel Pageau\u2019s second-period goal for offside, Pageau said he didn\u2019t know whether he had crossed the blue line ahead of Simon Holmstrom.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was so, so tight,\u201d he said. \u201cI don\u2019t get the replay on the board like you guys [reporters]. I think you guys have a better view. Luckily they called it a goal on the ice, it stayed like that.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WASHINGTON \u2014 Mat Barzal explained his tardiness that led to a healthy scratch Thursday night as an \u201calarm…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":347223,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[42],"tags":[169448,1301,293,62,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-347222","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-mathew-barzal","9":"tag-new-york-islanders","10":"tag-nhl","11":"tag-sports","12":"tag-united-states","13":"tag-unitedstates","14":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115472688182458982","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347222","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=347222"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347222\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/347223"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=347222"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=347222"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=347222"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}