Game Day #9: No Changes To The Blue Jackets' Lineup Wednesday Night; Merzlikins Back In Net Versus Islanders

Following Monday's dominate 6-1 win over the Edmonton Oilers, it's a fair question to ponder: what kind of encore can the Columbus Blue Jackets deliver to the home crowd Wednesday night when they face the New York Islanders?

The Blue Jackets skated circles around the Oilers in the victory, taking a 6-0 lead into the final minute of the game before Edmonton scored a shutout-breaking goal with just 27 seconds left. 

The win was Columbus' third straight game with at least a point, and they've picked up five of the last six possible points. That may not seem like too much, but it's something they haven't done in over a full calendar year, dating back to a brief streak last season that ended October 24th, 2023.

Their five-goal win was also rare air for the margin of victory: it tied a 9-4 win in December of last season against Buffalo, and the Blue Jackets didn't have a goal win in the season prior to that. The last time they won by a margin greater than Monday's 6-1 final was in January of 2022 — a span of over 1,000 days — when they shut out the Carolina Hurricanes 6-0. 

But regardless of the result, head coach Dean Evason is only looking forward.

"They're preparing the right way to play that next game, regardless of what happens (in the last game)," Evason said following the win.

Here's what to know before the Blue Jackets and Islanders take the ice:

• Lineups for Wednesday night are identical to what Evason and company put out Monday. That includes Elvis Merzlikins between the pipes, following his best performance in quite some time in Monday's win. Dating back to last season, it was the first time in 15 starts Merzlikins gave up less than two goals in a start. 
   
• The Blue Jackets have been the beneficiaries of some early-season scheduling: Wednesday’s game against the Islanders is the 4th consecutive game (and 6th of the last seven) in which Columbus is catching a team on the second leg of a back-to-back. Meanwhile, the Blue Jackets are yet to play on consecutive nights. They've also had seven of their last games at home. All of that to say this: it's another game where the Blue Jackets should look to jump on their opposition early.
   
• After a few games away from Sean Monahan and Kirill Marchenko on the top line, Yegor Chinakhov rejoined his original linemates on Monday and it paid off with an assist on Monahan's second goal of the game. Chinakhov has scored a point in all six games he's played with the pair, while being held without a point in the two games he was bumped to the second line. The move was made by Evason to work towards getting two reliable scoring lines, but it appears that (at least for now), the Blue Jackets coaching staff has decided to revert back to what was working for Columbus at a best-in-the-league rate. The trio led all lines in the NHL in 5v5 expected goal percentage, with 80% of all expected goals going in Columbus' favor while they were on the ice. No other line was higher than 74%. 
   
• Mathieu Olivier has four goals in eight games this season, just one away from tying his career high. He did that in each of the last two season's with the Blue Jackets, in 66 games (2022-23) and 54 games (2023-24). Fire emoji.
   
• Here are tonight's projected lines: