The winner of Sunday night's showdown would take sole possession of first place in the Atlantic Division. This matchup of New York-area teams, which did not involve the New Jersey Devils, was won by the upstart New York Islanders. The Islanders claimed a 7-4 victory over the New York Rangers at Madison Square Garden, thanks to four goals from Viktor Kozlov and 39 saves by Rick DiPietro. The victory was the Isles' fifth in seven games, though the two losses have come since losing team scoring leader Alexei Yashin to a knee injury a week ago. Yashin may be out as long as a month, but the Isles have shown plenty of firepower without him the last two games. They produced their highest goal total in a month in Saturday's 5-3 win over the Penguins in Pittsburgh. Then they erupted for four first-period goals against the Rangers' Henrik Lundqvist on Sunday, en route to the 7-4 win. That's the highest game total this season, and New York scored as many as seven goals only once all last season, in a 7-3 win in Atlanta on Nov. 16, 2005. The key question is: is this year's team markedly better than last year's? Although the 2005-06 version finished out of the playoffs at 36-40-6, that team did start 14-12-1, which isn't all that far off from this year's 14-9-3 record. The big difference so far, however, is that the 2006-07 Islanders are allowing nearly three-quarters of a goal less per game than last year's club. Their current rank in the league in goals allowed per game is 10th, compared to 25th a year ago. DiPietro has been very solid in the early going, and he faced 80 shots in the two wins over the weekend. New York's scoring also is up a bit over last season, but with Yashin probably out through the end of the year, the Islanders will need to maintain their early success in their own end to stay near the top of the Atlantic Division.