Islanders’ Bo Horvat on Leon Draisaitl’s slash: ‘It looked pretty dirty’

VANCOUVER, British Columbia – Bo Horvat didn’t think so in the moment. But he now believes Leon Draisaitl’s penalized and subsequently fined whack at his knees was “dirty.”

“I couldn’t believe it, to be honest with you,” Horvat said before the Islanders faced his former team, the Canucks, on Wednesday night at Rogers Arena. “I didn’t think he did it like that. I thought it was like he pushed the back of my leg. I didn’t realize he full-on cross-checked me.”

The NHL fined the Oilers’ Draisaitl the maximum $5,000 on Tuesday for his second-period tripping penalty against Horvat in the Islanders’ 4-1 loss in Edmonton on Monday.

“I’m not going to lie,” Horvat said. “It looked pretty dirty. It definitely wasn’t a clean play. I don’t know if he was just mad because I hit him a couple of times. But you shouldn’t be doing that to the back of guys’ knees like that. That’s how you get hurt. Luckily, I didn’t, but you’ve just got to be careful of that.”

Martin back in

 Left wing Matt Martin was in his usual fourth-line spot with center Casey Cizikas and Cal Clutterbuck on Wednesday after being a healthy scratch for the first time this season against the Oilers.

 Julien Gauthier played his second game of the season on Monday but resumed his regular role as a healthy scratch against the Canucks.

 “We’ve got a lot of games going forward here so we want to use a number of bodies and keep people fresh,” coach Lane Lambert said.

 Martin said the coaching staff did not discuss with him whether he needed to make any specific improvements to his game.

 “It always stinks when you’re not on the ice,” Martin said. “We don’t play this game for a living to not play it. But we move on.”

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.