Recap: Devils down Rangers 4-2

September 28, 2008   ·   Adam   ·   Jump to comments

The Devils dealt the Rangers another pre-season blow before a crowd of 15,361 at the Garden yesterday.  Goals came from Brian Gionta, Patrik Elias (2), and Dainus Zubrus on the Devils.  For the Rangers, Markus Naslund netted his first of the pre-season, and Nikolai Zherdev clocked one in as well.

Henrik Lundqvist was in mid-season form letting in 4 goals on 12 shots over 2 periods of play.  Backup Stephen Valiquette stepped in facing 11 shots total and letting nothing past.

Kevin Weekes stopped all 10 shots faced, while Scott Clemenson allowed 2 goals on 14 shots total.

Total shots were 23 for NJ, 24 for NY.

Overall, this was a great game for New Jersey’s top line of Elias-Rolston-Gionta, seeing the three make some pretty plays while also shooting a lot of puck (12 shots total generating 3 goals).  Following them, the “750-line” (dubbed by Colin White) of Zubrus-Holik-Rupp scored a goal on 3 shots total.

On Defense, White and Oduya performed very well, with Anssi Salmela showing his stuff as the new guy.  Not much to say here, they kept the puck out of the zone and cleared it well.

It’s becoming evident as to who will stay and who will go.  With only 2 potential roster spots open (winger on the 4th line, and partner on last defensive line), the young prospects had to be very stellar to make the team.

On defense, it appears Brent Sutter wants to keep Mike Mottau, not because he did extremely well, but that his performance is consistent and established.  As for the extra defenseman, Salmela should stay as he performed well and showed some stability.  He will probably sit out more than play.  Matt Corrente needs some time to get seasoned in the AHL.  He let the prospect of getting into the NHL get to his head, and it showed.  While in yesterday’s game, he performed well and with improved poise, his prior performance was not good enough to make the cut in an already intensely competitive competition for few roster spots.  Sheldon Brookbank showed exactly why he is what he is… depth defenseman.  The Devils will probably carry him as practice fodder or shoot him into the sun.

On offense, things appear to be quite set.  Mike Rupp will probably interchange with some dude… probably LeBlonde on the 4th line as he appears to be fiesty and a fighter who is still young.  Fedor Federov is an enigma in a box in a garbage can.  With the puck, he does well… but without?  Question marks are not good when there is so much competition.

Essentially, the team is shaping up quite well, and there aren’t going to be too many changes going into the regular season.

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Now on to the Rangers…

Their performance yesterday was quite poor… not due to a lack of skill, but more towards a lack of energy.  Playing so many games in the week (6 games in 8 nights) may have something to do with that.  In the 3rd period, they began to battle back, but it became a game of “too little, too late”.

On the bright side: Gomez, Drury, Dubinski played well.  It was unfortunate that Korpikoski was booted out so early on what was an entirely bogus call.  He has had a lot of good talk around him and I personally was interested in seeing him play against the Devils.

On the shady side: Redden and Lundqvist really stood out to me.  Lundqvist really did not play well at all.  It could be his knees, it could be he was tired.  Who knows.  We won’t be able to tell until the regular season kicks in.  But many fans will be keeping a close eye on his performance over the next few weeks just to be sure.

Wade Redden… skate problems?  I hope so for his sake.  Mr. 6 years @ 6 mil each needs to play up to that level… ESPECIALLY in the city of New York.  When a player comes to the big apple with a contract like that (in NHL terms), then a certain type of play is expected of him.  Falling down, coughing up the puck, and leaving his defensive assignments open does not help.  He needs to lock it up ASAP, or he will become the next Marek Malik… for 6 years (that contract alone is like a NTC).  I hope for the latter… the Garden Boo-Birds really brighten up my day (Hehe).

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Final comments:  It’s only preseason.  Both clubs were ~50% AHLers, so it is really tough to guage capabilities at this point.  I really like how the Devils are shaping up right now… few major changes allows them to build on what they have, and improve with experience.

The Rangers?  Too many changes during the off-season will hurt them.  It took half a season for them to get their act together last year… and it may be the same story this year.  Personally, this whole “youth movement” thing is just fancy talk for a mini-rebuild.

I’ll write some more on the subject later-on.