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Brind'Amour's hat trick helps Hurricanes crush Islanders

Oct 28, 2007 - 3:22 AM By Doug Mittler PA SportsTicker Contributing Writer

UNIONDALE, New York (Ticker) -- It was Rod Brind'Amour and the Carolina Hurricanes, not the New York Islanders, who came out like they had a full week's rest.

Brind'Amour scored a pair of first-period goals en route to his third career hat trick and Ray Whitney and Justin Williams each tallied twice as the Hurricanes bounced back from a lackluster performance 24 hours earlier to rout the Islanders, 8-3, on Saturday.

Backup goaltender John Grahame stopped 28 shots for the Hurricanes, who were playing for the fourth time in six nights. Grahame also stopped a penalty shot by Richard Park in the third period.

"I was looking for Park to make the first move, and he did," Grahame said. "He tried a backhand, and it just rolled off his stick."

The Hurricanes allowed four power-play goals in the first period of Friday's 7-4 loss to Montreal. One night later, Carolina jumped to a 3-0 lead after one period thanks to a pair of tallies by Brind'Amour, and led, 6-1, midway through the second.

"It's always a good sign when the team comes back like that from the night we had last night," said Hurricanes coach Peter Laviolette, who coached the Islanders for two seasons beginning in 2000. "I think a lot of things just happened to go Montreal's way last night, and tonight, the same thing happened to us."

It was a night of milestones for Brind'Amour, who recorded his first hat trick since January 7, 2001 against the Islanders while also collecting his 1,000th career penalty minute.

"The hat trick is not a big deal," Brind'Amour said. "I mean, it's nice, I'll take it, but it really doesn't matter as long as we win."

The 19-year veteran seemed more surprised with the penalty milestone.

"Oh well, when you've been in the league this long, you're bound to come near a record or two," Brind'Amour said.

Rick DiPietro allowed six goals on just 14 shots for the Islanders before being lifted with 12:12 left in the second.

New York had not played since an overtime win against New Jersey last Saturday but came out flat, allowing Carolina to score three times in less than 15 minutes.

"It was just a case where we got beat by a better team tonight," Islanders center Mike Sillinger said. "They beat us to loose pucks. They were the hungrier team."

Brind'Amour skated into the left faceoff circle and one-timed a pass from Jeff Hamilton past DiPietro for a power-play goal at 2:58. The Hurricanes' captain has a point in nine straight games.

Matt Cullen then outhustled Islanders defenseman Radek Martinek to the puck behind the net. With DiPietro caught out of position, Cullen fed Whitney, who easily scored at 9:25 to make it 2-0.

Brind'Amour netted his fifth of the season when he put home the rebound of a shot by defenseman Dennis Seidenberg at 14:12.

The closest the Islanders came to a goal in the first period was when Miroslav Satan hit the goalpost with a backhander late in the session.

Facing Grahame instead of No. 1 goalie Cam Ward was no excuse.

"Every goalie in this league is good," Islanders captain Bill Guerin said. "There is very little difference between the first and second guys. There are no bad goalies in this league."

Whitney scored his seventh goal of the season 77 seconds into the middle session off a pass from Erik Cole to make it 4-0.

Ruslan Fedotenko scored the Islanders' first goal off a scramble in front at 2:51, but the Hurricanes answered less than two minutes later with a tally by Williams. Eric Staal caught DiPietro out of position and scored at 7:48, chasing the netminder in favor of Wade Dubielewicz.

Blue-liner Marc-Andre Bergeron cut the deficit to 6-2 when he scored a power-play goal on a shot that deflected off a defender at 10:27.

However, Brind'Amour and Williams scored man-advantage tallies 21 seconds apart early in the third to give Carolina a commanding 8-2 bulge.

"We're certainly not happy. Everything went wrong for us," Islanders coach Ted Nolan said. "We just have to regroup and get back to work."

Sillinger scored his first goal of the season on a power play with six seconds left for the Islanders.

Dubielewicz made 10 saves for New York.