Brock Nelson and Nick Leddy scored 2:24 apart early in the third period to rally the New York Islanders to a 3-1 victory over the crosstown-rival Rangers on Thursday night.
Jaroslav Halak stopped 34 shots to beat Rangers goalie Henrik Lundqvist for the eighth straight time, including five wins with the Islanders. Kyle Okposo added an empty-netter with less than 2 seconds left.
Marc Staal scored late in the second period for the Rangers and Lundqvist finished with 29 saves.
With the teams skating 4-on-4, Nelson tied it at 1:53 of the third with his 18th of the season and fourth in two games. With the puck in the offensive zone, Nelson was taken down by a Rangers player, got up and took a pass from Adam Pelech and wristed it past Lundqvist.
Leddy put the Islanders ahead when John Tavares skated from behind the net on the right side and sent a pass to Leddy. The defenseman wristed it into the top left corner at 4:17 with his second of the season.
The Islanders won their second straight and moved two points ahead of the Rangers for second place in the Metropolitan Division. The teams began the day 16 points behind first-place Washington and four ahead of fourth place New Jersey.
The Islanders, 9-3-2 in division play, won the teams' first meeting, 2-1 in a shootout here on Dec. 2. This one was played just as tight.
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The Rangers finally broke through in the final minute of the second period. On a rush, Kevin Hayes had the puck down the right side, spun around and sent a centering pass that went off Kreider's stick before Staal tipped it in on the left side for his second goal of the season and first in 36 games with 46 seconds to go.
The Rangers' Dylan McIlrath and the Islanders' Matt Martin dropped gloves with 1.5 seconds left in the second, but the linesman quickly intervened before any punches were thrown. Both players were whistled for unsportsmanlike conduct minors.
The Rangers had a 14-10 advantage on shots in a scoreless first period, but the Islanders had some great chances.
Lundqvist stopped Nick Leddy's slap shot through traffic from inside the blue line in the opening minute. The Rangers' goalie also had big saves on breakaways by Tavares and Cal Clutterbuck.
Calvin de Haan wristed a shot that Lundqvist stopped with his blocker and then gathered with about 8 minutes to go.
Earlier in the period, the Rangers had several stabs at a loose puck to Halak's left while the Islanders goalie was down on his knees. Later, Stepan skated in on Halak, hesitated and couldn't get his stick on the puck as he got near the goalie.
Cizikas had a one-timer from the left faceoff dot that Lundqvist stopped with about 4 minutes left.
The Islanders picked up their intensity in the second period.
The Rangers' Chris Kreider had a shot that rang off the right post early in the period. The Islanders then controlled play for a large stretch, keeping the puck in the offensive zone, but couldn't get anything past Lundqvist.
The Rangers' goalie stopped a rebound chance by Ryan Strome with about 6 minutes remaining in the period. He then saved a shot by Frans Nielsen about a minute later.
Halak stopped a shot by Ryan McDonagh and the Rangers had several attempts in close with about 2 1/2 minutes left, but the goalie stopped them and then covered the puck.
