WINNIPEG, Manitoba -- It was New Year's Eve at the MTS Centre on Saturday night, but you could be excused if you thought the Winnipeg Jets and the New York Islanders were ringing in 1982.

Mike Bossy, Bryan Trottier and Billy Smith were nowhere to be found, but the 6-2 beatdown the New Yorkers put on the hosts was reminiscent of the franchise's glory days in the early 1980s.

Left winger Shane Prince scored the winning goal and Thomas Greiss stopped 32 shots in the victory, one day after being unofficially anointed the No. 1 goalie after the Islanders waived Jaroslav Halak and shipped him to the minors.

The Islanders also got goals from forwards Nikolay Kulemin, John Tavares, Ryan Strome, Anders Lee and former Jets captain Andrew Ladd.

The Jets didn't get on the scoreboard until the last minute of the second period -- by which point the Islanders had built a 4-0 lead -- but goals from forwards Shawn Matthias and Nikolaj Ehlers were way too little way too late to erase any doubt about the final outcome.

The victory improved the Islanders' record to 15-15-6 for 36 points. The Jets fell to 17-19-3 for 37 points.

Greiss said the ability to roll four lines in a balanced attack was crucial to the Islanders' success.

"It's huge. You can't always rely on one or two guys," Greiss said. "Everybody's got to chip in. It was a great example today and made the game easy for us."

Jets goalie Connor Hellebuyck stopped just 11 of 15 shots before being pulled. On the first shot after Prince's second-period goal -- an easy glove save -- Jets fans gave him the Bronx cheer.

The Jets' second-year goalie didn't last the period. Just seconds after the Islanders had killed off a penalty, Strome beat him to the five-hole for his sixth goal of the season.

When Michael Hutchinson was announced as Hellebuyck's replacement with 5:47 left in the second period, he was given a rousing ovation. Hutchinson stopped seven of nine Islanders shots.

But the biggest ovation was saved for Ladd, who served as the Jets' captain for nearly five seasons before being shipped to Chicago at the trade deadline last spring and signing a monster free agent contract with the Islanders in the summer.

Ladd had just launched a wrist shot from the high slot to score his eighth goal of the year at the halfway mark of the third period before he was leveled by former teammate Dustin Byfuglien.

Asked about the last thing he saw before the hulking defenseman's shoulder crashed into his chest and sent him flying to the ice, Ladd smiled and said, "the puck go in the net.

"I saw him coming, but at that point I was committed to the shot. Any time you're playing your former team, you want to come up with a good effort. You've got a little jump in your legs and there's some excitement to it.

"I'm happy to have scored, but the two points for us was a lot bigger than any of that."

Ladd said he enjoys lining up against former teammates at faceoffs.

"It's fun playing hard against guys you know really well and trying to get the better of them. Buff and I are really good friends and it's fun to get under his skin and I'm sure he's going to do the same to me," he said.

Postgame comments in the Jets' dressing room were brief. Captain Blake Wheeler clocked in with his shortest scrum of the year at 41 seconds.

"(The game) was pretty self-explanatory. It wasn't good enough and the score was indicative of that," he said.

The Jets outshot the Islanders 34-24, but it was an obvious case of quantity over quality.

Few of the Jets' shots presented much of a challenge to Greiss.

The Islanders might want to petition the NHL to play on New Year's Eve every year. They're 10-0-1 in last 11 games on Dec. 31. The last time they lost before the calendar turned was 1998.

NOTES: Healthy scratches for the Jets were C Alex Burmistrov, D Mark Stuart and RW Chris Thorburn. Joining them from the Islanders were RW Stephen Gionta, D Adam Pelech and LW Anthony Beauvillier. ... Jets D Dustin Byfuglien leads all non-goalies with an average of 27 minutes, 30 seconds of ice time per game. ... The Islanders lead the NHL in blocked shots with 665. D Calvin de Haan has been most willing to sacrifice his body with 101 blocked shots. ... The Islanders have won the last three meetings with the Jets, including both games last season. They have also beaten the Jets four consecutive times at the MTS Centre. ... Jets GM Kevin Cheveldayoff is a former draft pick of the Islanders, having been selected 16th overall in the 1988 entry draft. ... The Jets were 4 of 14 on the power play in their last four games.