On January 6th, 2026, Casey Cizikas registered two goals and an assist, helping the New York Islanders to a victory over the New Jersey Devils.
A good game, no doubt. Three points for a checking line forward, whose main objective on a night-to-night basis is keeping the puck out of his own net.
But the three-point effort was particularly rare for Cizikas; the 34-year-old who stands a shade under six-feet-tall and tips the scales at 191 lbs. It was his first three-point night since October 17th, 2017, when an empty-netter gave him two goals and an assist in a matchup with the Buffalo Sabres. A gap of 3003 days.
Sidney Crosby. Alexander Ovechkin. Evgeni Malkin. Anze Kopitar. Jamie Benn. Ryan Nugent-Hopkins. Mikael Backlund. Casey Cizikas?
What do these eight have in common, you ask? These are the current NHL forwards who have played 900 career games for their respective NHL franchises and never left.
Look back at that list.
Crosby. A Mount Rushmore player, in the midst of his…don’t adjust your screen brightness…record-setting 21st consecutive season averaging a point per game. When you’re breaking records set by a guy named Gretzky, you’ve done alright.
Ovechkin. 900 GOALS. With the body of a Dad who spends his time in the hot tub while the kids take swimming lessons at the public pool. When you’re breaking records set by a guy named Gretzky, you’ve done alright.
Malkin. Does he wear the same visor your parents cheaped out on in that one year you tried refereeing as a 13-year old? Yes. But he also has three cups, a Hart, and has nearly 1400 career points.
Kopitar. Hockey Reference says his nickname is Raccoon Jesus. That doesn’t add to my point, but maybe his Cups, Selkes, Lady Byngs, or 1300 points do. Raccoon Jesus is a little wordy, but it’s an elite nickname.
Benn. Speaking of visors, this mule doesn’t even wear one. The Captain in Dallas has 400 goals, is approaching 1000 points, and has an Art Ross in the trophy case.
Nugent-Hopkins. The only player in league history who will be ID’d trying to buy beer after the final game of a 20-year career, Nuge was the first overall pick in 2011 and will cross 800 points before season’s end.
Backlund. Definitely not headed to the Hockey Hall of Fame. But the Swede has been a contributor to the Flames - who he captains - since 2009. And if you’re thinking he and Cizikas have had a similar career, consider Cizikas’s career-best season would be Backlund’s TENTH best campaign.
That leaves us with Cizikas. 275 points in 945 games of grit, sandpaper, and consistency. All for one NHL franchise that got him, loved him, and never let him go.
In the NHL, single-franchise careers are generally reserved for Hall of Famers. For franchise captains. For the faces that get blown up and wrapped on the side of an arena to signify to fans “this is who we are.” Casey Cizikas is, realistically, none of those. But, for more than a decade, the New York Islanders have rolled out #53 in blue and orange, where he has become a franchise mainstay and staple.
Drafted in the fourth round, 92nd overall in the 2009 entry draft, Cizikas was a product of the Mississauga St. Michael’s Majors, where he spent four seasons in the Ontario Hockey League. Some players are elite scorers in the junior ranks, but are forced down the lineup in pro hockey, necessitating a commitment to refining the defensive parts of their game.
But Cizikas was, is, and will always be a checker. For the Majors, he registered 203 career points in 2437 career games, peaking in 2011 with a 64-point campaign. Strong production, but hardly the type of scoring that you bookmark as a likely indicator of a 1000-game NHL career.
But, even as a teenager, it was his well-rounded, relentless approach that stood out. He made Team Canada in their 2011 silver medal effort at the World Juniors, where he was handed a shutdown role alongside wingers Zack Kassian and Louis Leblanc. Cizikas would register three points in the tournament, while giving a glimpse of how his game may profile at the professional ranks.
But why has he lasted? Why is his name on the same short list as some of the greatest to ever lace up skates?
Because the New York Islanders do not ask Casey Cizikas to tilt the scoreboard. They ask Casey Cizikas to tilt the ice. And he has been, effectively, tilting the ice on Long Island for fifteen seasons. When considering the “ice-tilters” in the National Hockey League, one’s mind obviously gravitates to the electric, puck-possession maestros who make opposing defenders sweat. But it takes a special skillset to make the electric, puck-possession maestros sweat.
A defensive-zone faceoff? He’s got you. He has a 69.3 D zone start percentage in his career, including a 79.9% in 2017-2018. A forecheck that hems in a defensive pairing, in hopes of NYI’s scoring threats hopping on the ice to face a worn-down blueline? On it. Bravely getting in the way of a point shot, to keep the puck out of harm’s way? Cizikas is sixth among active forwards in blocks. Despite not being physically imposing in the traditional sense, he is 12th among active forwards in career hits. The Islanders have not clung to Cizikas for the boxscore. They have retained him, year after year, because he helps the team make sense.
120 goals and 275 points. Only Ryan Reaves, among active forwards, has scored less points in as many games. He has scored more than 10 goals in a season just once. And yet, Cizikas has stayed. And the Islanders have welcomed him with open arms, slotting him faithfully into the lineup to play between 11 and 14 minutes a night.
The hardest thing to find in hockey is actually not the 40 goal scorer. It is the player whose absence would alter how a team behaves.
Perhaps, it was a match made in hockey heaven. The defensively responsible, structured, disciplined Islanders, and the checking forward who embodies so many of the stabilizing values that embody the franchise. Perhaps Cizikas’s predictability has been identified by the Isles as a foundation that allows them to construct with creativity elsewhere, rather than seeing it as a ceiling that limits his relative possibilities.
Or maybe, just maybe, when so many teams are out looking for a “Casey Cizikas type,” the Islanders can look to their dressing room and know they have THE Casey Cizikas in house.