Nowadays, people will talk about crimes of the century and storms of the century and the Tragically Hip even sang about getting Ahead by a Century. This, of course, is either brilliant poetry (in the case of Gord Downie) or silly hyperbole. The reality is, we get a storm of the century every couple of months; and crimes of the century on a frighteningly regular basis.



But now, here are the New York Islanders, who have a chance to duplicate something this season that actually hasn’t been done in the NHL for a full century.



No hype. All real.



Only once before in NHL history has a team gone from worst to first in the league defensively – and that happened 101 years ago when the 1917-18 Ottawa Senators surrendered 114 goals-against in the 22-game inaugural NHL regular season and then gave up only 53 the next year (in the shortened 18-game season). Even Islanders general manager Lou Lamoriello, with all of his lengthy institutional knowledge,...