It Happened at the Coliseum … on FEBRUARY 12th

7 years ago tonight (2008) – The Isles were reeling when they entertained the Flyers on this date.  Trent Hunter did his best to change that, scoring a goal and adding two assists as the Isles defeated Philadelphia 4-3.

Jeff Tambellini, Sean Bergenheim and Ruslan Fedotenko also scored for the Isles, who broke seven game winless streaks both overall (0-6-1) and at home (0-5-2).

Rick DiPietro recorded his 20th victory, stopping a personal 0-6-2 streak. It was DiPietro’s fourth consecutive 20-win season, one shy of Chico Resch's club record (5).  DiPietro would win six more games that season, but only 14 NHL games in the seasons after that.

Fedotenko’s goal midway through the third proved to be the winner.  He told Newsday’s Greg Logan: "(Isles coach Ted Nolan) just wanted me to find my game and go more to the front of the net, create some traffic and bring the puck to the net, I've been trying to find the perfect play on the outside and hold the puck and go in the corners, but you can't score goals from the corners. I just tried to bring my body to the front of the net, and hopefully, good things would happen like on the first goal."

The win was the start of a six-game win streak for the Isles; they have not won six straight during a single season since (the Isles won the last 3 games last season and the first four games this season).

Here are the highlights, from the NHL on Versus, with Long Island native Joe Beninati on the call:

Also on this date: (1980) – Chico Resch and Markus Mattsson were both perfect as the Islanders and Winnipeg played a scoreless tie.  The game was played the same night the USA began their Miracle on Ice run in Lake Placid with a 2-2 tie with Sweden.

I don't have any video of the Isles game, but check out the last 41 seconds of USA-Sweden here. (I believe the audio is from Ron Reusch's call on CTV in Canada)

All-time, the Isles have played eleven February 12th games at the Coliseum and have compiled a 4-6-1 record on this date at 1255 Hempstead Turnpike in Uniondale.  The 12th and final February 12th home game is tonight –as the Isles host Toronto at 7:00. Make sure you’re there, because after tonight, there are only 16 regular season games remaining.