The New York Islanders have had a hard time playing in afternoon games recently. Last season, they were just 1-6-1 in matinees. Maybe it's because game time is roughly when the team would be taking their pre-game nap for a regularly scheduled 7:00 PM start.

Today, the team played as if they were sleeping for much of the game as the Buffalo Sabres embarrassed the Isles 7-1 at the Nassau Coliseum. Thomas Vanek scored twice for Buffalo while Ales Kotalik and Jason Pominville each had a goal and two assists. Patrick Lalime made 23 saves to earn his first victory of the season.

Isles' coach Scott Gordon was not pleased with his team's effort.

"We were not even close with our fore-check, we weren't very good in the neutral zone. We didn't even change effectively - we didn't step on the ice and get to spots. Out of all the games we played, collectively, this just wasn't very good."

The Islanders also took far too many penalties. By game's end, Buffalo had 12 chances with the man advantage and they scored three times. You know a team had a rough game when the coach says that penalty killing was the one thing the team did relatively well but they still allowed three power play goals.

The Isles came out flat in the first period and were outshot 13-7. The only goal of the first 20 minutes came at the 10:05 mark when Jochen Hecht shot the puck from the side of the net, behind the goal line which bounced off Isles' backup goalie Joey MacDonald and into the goal.

MacDonald, who played well in the Isles' first two games, was shaky this afternoon, allowing at least two soft goals. In his defense, MacDonald really didn't get much support from his teammates. Starter Rick DiPietro is still listed as day-to-day and was on the bench as MacDonald's backup although Gordon said he never considered replacing MacDonald.

The Sabres scored four second period goals to break the game open including three in a span of 2:32 which put the game out of reach. Vanek scored once shorthanded and once on the power play and the outcome of the game was no longer in doubt.

A brawl broke out four seconds after the Sabres increased their lead to 4-0 which resulted in three players receiving game misconducts. The initial battle broke out between Nate Thompson of the Islanders and Buffalo's Adam Mair but there were at least two additional battles during a prolonged scrum. Sean Bergenheim and Brendan Witt were ejected for the Islanders while Sabres' captain Craig Rivet received a double game misconduct. Witt received stitches after being body slammed to the ice by Rivet in a move that looked like it came straight out of the WWE.

Kotalik and Clarke MacArthur scored in the third for Buffalo while Trent Hunter ended Lalime's shutout bid 5:21 into the third period in what was the Islanders' only major bright spot.

"We didn't execute and I just don't mean offensively," Islanders' captain Bill Guerin said after the game. "We didn't get a lot of pucks out of our end, we didn't get pucks into their end when we had to and we didn't execute defensively as well. For us to be successful, we're going to have to play stronger than that. We have to learn from it, obviously."

The Islanders have two days off before heading south to play at Tampa Bay Thursday and Florida on Saturday. In between, Gordon will certainly spend a lot of time working with his team on the intricacies of his system. Perhaps the only other piece of good news for the Islanders is they don't have another afternoon game for the next four weeks. By then, the club hopes to have a new routine worked out to prepare for afternoon starts.

NOTES:

The Islanders wore their white uniforms for today's game which was dubbed, "Kids Opening Day." They brought in 15 mascots to help entertain the crowd including local favorites Mr. Met and Quackerjack and NHL mascots from as far away as Vancouver, Florida, Atlanta and New Jersey.

Radek Martinek, who was injured in Saturday night's game against the Blues, was scratched today and replaced in the lineup by Jack Hillen.