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Devils Blow Out Sens; Shut Out by Isles

It was a tale of two games for the Devils tonight. They played two split-squad games, one at Summerside, Prince Edward Island in the Kraft Hockeyville Canada game against the Ottawa Senators and one that started an hour later at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York against the New York Islanders. They came away 1-1 on the night, beating the Senators 8-1 and losing to the Islanders, 3-0.

Now, obviously, the Devils had their “A” team playing at the Credit Union Place in PEI while the “JV,” so to speak, was playing down the North American coast in Brooklyn. But both games showed some very interesting things for fans to take in and digest.

Full disclosure: I did not get to see the game in Canada due to it being blacked out regionally down here on the NHL Network. I am again going by what I could scrounge up from the Internet. I did get to see the Islander game, as it was televised locally on MSG+, however.

Let’s start with the good news, shall we? The Devils defeated the Sens, 8-1 after jumping out to a 5-0 lead in the first period. According to Amanda Stein on the Devils’ website in her “10 Takeaways” column, Marcus Johansson scored “less than two minutes into the game.” She also said that Johansson had four points on the night, as he also had three assists.

Drew Stafford, Pavel Zacha and John Quenneville each had two goals for John Hynes’ squad while Nico Hischier also added one to give the Devils the boost. The Devils had a 7-0 lead when Mike Condon was relieved in goal by Andrew Hammond (a preseason thing, he was not chased, apparently).

Speaking of the goaltenders, Cory Schneider played the whole game and made 20 saves on 21 shots faced.

Meanwhile, in New York….

Geoff Ward was coaching the Devils’ “B” team and things did not go as smoothly against the Islanders. They fell 3-0, falling into some penalty trouble and being smothered in the shots on goal department.

Keith Kinkaid, the Long Island-native, made the start and played the entire game for New Jersey. He made 42 saves on 44 shots against. With an empty net goal, the Islanders would finish with 45 shots on goal. For New York, Thomas Greiss started and also played the whole game. He made 25 saves in the Islanders’ shut out win.

The Islanders took the early lead just 1:11 into the game when Brock Nelson scored from Josh Ho-Sang and Johnny Boychuk. Just that suddenly, it was 1-0 Isles and that was all they needed.

At the 12:02 mark of the first, the Devils’ Ben Thomson took on the Islanders’ Scott Mayfield in a good scrap that brought some energy to the game.

Then, at the 13:54 mark of the first, Joseph Blandisi was called for slashing, a not uncommon sight in this preseason with the crackdown on slashing, and the Islanders went on the power play. Mathew Barzal would score a nice goal, using his speed to slice through the Devils defense and making a good move around Kinkaid to give the Isles a 2-0 lead. John Tavares had the lone assist on the goal. That goal made New York 1-for-6 on the power play while the Devils finished the night 0-for-1.

Late in the first period, a scary moment occurred when Michael McLeod of the Devils was helped off of the ice with an apparent leg injury. He was favoring his left leg and would not return.

The Devils’ best period was the second when they actually outshot New York and really tested Greiss. They missed on a 3-on-1 late in the period and he stopped Jimmy Hayes on a nice chance late in the period too.

The Devils would pull Kinkaid with a little over a minute left in the game and Johnny Boychuk would score the empty netter from Nikolay Kulemin and Cal Clutterbuck to put the game away at 18:41.

In the end, the Devils were outshot 45 to 25 and lost 52-percent of their faceoffs. But those were the only places where the Devils were outplayed on the stat sheet. They out hit the Islanders, 29 to 24, had 15 blocked shots to 13 for New York and only gave away the puck four times to the Isles’ 11.

In the end, despite losing in Brooklyn (and getting blanked to boot), the Devils outscored their opponents on the night, 8-4, which is a good sign for the big squad and gives Devils fans some optimism as they head into the season. They just may have opened some eyes in Canada.

Next up, the Devils head south to Washington on Wednesday for their final game of the preseason. That game will be televised on MSG+ and we will have a recap here for you.

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Devils Fall in OT to Rangers in Second Preseason Game

The Devils ventured across the Hudson River to Madison Square Garden to take on the rival Rangers in the team’s second preseason game of the year. It was a good matchup, marred by a choppy flow that came from the officials calling everything and anything and in the end, the Rangers came away with the 4-3 overtime victory.

Kevin Shattenkirk was making his Rangers debut tonight with the highly hyped free agent suiting up for the Blueshirts in the first time at MSG. The Devils were not dressing Nico Hischier or Will Butcher. New signee Drew Stafford and captain Andy Greene slotted in instead.

The goaltending matchup saw Cory Schneider make his first preseason start. He made 14 saves on 17 shots in 30:16 of ice time. He looked good, making two post-to-post stops in close that stood out. Opposing him for the first half of the game was the Rangers’ Henrik Lundqvist, who made 11 saves on 13 shots in 30:09 of time on ice. Their relief for the second half of the game saw Mackenzie Blackwood come in for New Jersey, going 11-for-12 in 34:35 while New York put out Alexandar Georgiev who was 15-for-16 in 34:08.

The major story from this game were the new rule changes and how they were being called. Faceoff infractions were the main thing here. Two faceoff infractions on one faceoff now results in a delay of game penalty, and the linesmen are being more strict with what they are calling as infractions. For instance, if a player’s skate crosses over the line that runs in front of the faceoff dot in the circles, an infraction can be called. If a player on the outside breaks into the circle too soon, an infraction can be called.

In the end, the Devils were 1-for-7 on the power play while the Rangers finished 2-for-9, including the game winner in OT with the man advantage. There were a few 5-on-3’s for both teams due to the nature of the officials calling everything they felt needed to be called.

The Rangers’ Kevin Hayes, whose brother, Jimmy, was in the Devils’ lineup tonight on a professional tryout (PTO), broke the seal on this one, scoring at 15:54 of the first period on the power play to give the Rangers the 1-0 lead. New York would take that lead into the first intermission. He got assists from Jimmy Vesey and Shattenkirk.

The Devils, however, would not take long to get that back. Just 4:11 into the second period, Miles Wood pushed the puck up to Stafford, who stopped along the far half wall in the Rangers zone, spun around and centered a pass to Pavel Zacha. The puck fluttered over to him and Zacha batted it out of the air and behind Lundqvist to tie the game at one.

But the Rangers would strike right back. Just 21 seconds after Zacha’s goal, Chris Kreider scored from Mats Zuccarello to put New York back in front, 2-1.

The back-and-forth nature of this game was evident when the Devils re-tied it at two at the 7:15 mark of the second. Stafford took the puck from Jimmy Hayes off the cycle on the power play. He left the puck for Brian Gibbons on a nice drop pass and Gibbons beat Lundqvist glove side to make it 2-2.

But once again, the Rangers had the answer with David Desharnais scoring from Shattenkirk and Kreider at 10:16 of the second to give the Rangers the 3-2 lead going into the second intermission.

The second period also featured a good scrap between the Devils’ Nick Lappin and Matt Puempel of the Rangers at the 13:00 mark.

The new faceoff infraction rules benefitted the Devils on the goal that would tie things up for them in the third period. After the Adam Henrique got kicked out of the faceoff circle, Jimmy Hayes came in to take the faceoff deep in the Rangers’ zone at the 3:20 mark of the third. Hayes won the faceoff back to Damon Severson, who ripped a shot as Hayes went towards the net. He tipped it past goaltender Georgiev to tie things up at three.

And that was it. The game went to the OT period tied at three. The Devils would get a good chance as Miles Wood was hauled down in the neutral zone and did not know that Pavel Zacha was coming in for the loose puck. He used his hand to try to get the puck to Zacha and was called for a hand pass. Zacha would have had a clear breakaway. Michael McLeod also made a nice kick save on a scramble in front of his own net when New York had a wide open net to shoot at.

Instead, it was Filip Chytil who scored with four seconds left in OT from Zuccarello and Shattenkirk on the power play to give the Rangers the 4-3 win.

Next up, the Devils play tomorrow night at Montreal. I do not think this one will be televised down here, but I will try to get something up if I can.