Islanders win home opener as Viktor Eklund gets his first NHL goal on 20th birthday

This was the home opener the Islanders wanted and the 20th birthday that rookie Victor Eklund hoped to have, especially after his mother made the trip from Sweden for it.

He just didn’t count on being serenaded by a UBS Arena sellout crowd of 17,345 with a round of “Happy Birthday” after a 6-0 rout of the Devils on Saturday night.

“It feels amazing,” Eklund said after notching his first NHL goal as part of his first NHL multi-point game. “Best fans. I can’t describe it in words. Just so happy and I appreciate it so much. I actually kind of don’t know the word, but some tears came.”

Now the Islanders and Eklund must continue to deliver these kinds of performances through the 84-game NHL season.

The Islanders played fast and connected with strong defensive structure and a hard forecheck. They created chances at the crease. They scored on the power play and their penalty kill went 5-for-5 with a shorthanded goal from Casey Cizikas.

The remnants and rust of the shorter preseason finally were shaken off.

“We went to work in training camp, it’s going on close to three weeks ago, and there was a lot of stuff, a lot of work in the video room,” coach Pete DeBoer said.

“Trying to establish some things. The guys really dialed in, and you want them to be rewarded for that commitment early because it promotes a belief in what you’re doing. If you don’t win games, it’s hard to build that.”

It certainly helped that Matthew Schaefer (two assists) was dominant across all three zones and Ilya Sorokin (37 saves) played at the same level that earned him a runner-up finish in the Vezina Trophy balloting for the NHL’s top goalie last season. He pushed his team record to 30 career shutouts.

“We continue to build our system,” Sorokin said. “Today we gave them a lot of chances but, in total, we played good. I saw a lot of pucks from the blue line so I feel like we have control of our crease.”

It all peaked in a three-goal second period for the Islanders, who had lost their season opener in Toronto, 2-1, on Wednesday night without scoring a five-on-five goal.

The Islanders played a strong third period in that game, getting a shorthanded goal late from Emil Heineman to halve the final deficit.

Clearly, there was a carry-over, and Devils coach Sheldon Keefe had predicted that would be the case.

The Islanders finished a sluggish 1-3-0 preseason with a dismal 4-1 loss to the visiting Devils on Sept. 26 that certainly raised questions about their readiness for the regular season, even if Schaefer did not dress for the game as he dealt with an upper-body tweak.

“I don’t take much from that preseason game,” Keefe said. “Just watching them play against the Leafs, they’re playing hard, they’re playing structured and organized. They play like a team that’s further down the line in preparation.”

The Islanders are still waiting to get top-six forward Mathew Barzal (left knee) back in the lineup after he missed all of training camp. The Islanders said on Saturday that the expectation is for Barzal to start skating on Thursday or Friday.

The Islanders entered Saturday’s game with two immediate aims: increase their goal production and establish a home-ice advantage early in the season.

“I don’t think it’s any secret: If you’re going to be a playoff team, you have to be a good home team,” DeBoer said. “There’s very few teams that get in that don’t establish a home-ice presence. This should be a hard place to play.”

Last season, the Islanders went a middling 22-17-2 at home and, not surprisingly, missed the playoffs for a second straight season, costing coach Patrick Roy his job in favor of DeBoer with four games remaining.

Their five-season home record entering Saturday was 107-73-25, which is a .583 points percentage. Typically, teams with point percentages of .600 or higher make the postseason.

The Islanders finished 24th in the NHL last season in goals scored with an average of 2.8 per game. They surpassed that average in a second-period span of eight minutes, 36 seconds.

Simon Holmstrom got to the crease and deposited Jean-Gabriel Pageau’s cross-ice feed to make it 1-0 at 3:32. Eklund dug the puck away from goalie Nico Daws (26 saves) and got it to Brayden Schenn for a 2-0 lead at 5:00 and Bo Horvat connected on a power-play one-timer off Schaefer’s feed for a three-goal edge at 12:08.

Eklund made it 4-0 at 11:32 of the third period as he got to the net off Cal Ritchie’s quick pass.

“Tonight we put it together better and managed the puck a lot better,” Ritchie said. “We had four lines rolling tonight, and that’s what you need to win. [Eklund] is unreal. You just see how hard he is on pucks. It’s a special day for him.”

Very special. It was everything Eklund and the Islanders could have hoped.

By Andrew Gross

andrew.gross@newsday.comAGrossNewsday

Andrew Gross joined Newsday in 2018 to cover the Islanders. He began reporting on the NHL in 2003 and has previously covered the Rangers and Devils. Other assignments have included the Jets, St. John’s and MLB.