Brodeur and Elias make history in Devils win

March 17, 2009   ·   Hasan   ·   Jump to comments

Years or even hours from now, most of the particulars of New Jersey’s 3-2 win over Chicago at the Rock will be forgotten except for two franchise icons both establishing records in front of a raucous sellout crowd.  Of course, Martin Brodeur won his 552nd career game, moving him past Patrick Roy and any other goalie that’s ever played in the NHL atop the all-time wins list - where he’ll stay for quite some time since there’s nobody on the horizon even in the same ballpark in number of wins.

Perhaps even more poignantly, Patrik Elias set a career Devils record for points in style, with a pretty assist on a Brian Gionta shorthanded goal late in the second period which proved to be the game-winner after the Hawks’ attempt to wipe out a 3-0 Devils lead and spoil the party came up just short.  The Devils’ emotive winger was practically moved to tears by the sellout crowd chanting his name over and over in the aftermath of the history-making assist, which moved him past long-time Devil (and current assistant) John MacLean with 702 points in the red and white.

Truth be told, those two memorable individual accomplishments actually overshadowed an entertaining game, which saw the Devils jump out in front after just 38 seconds with a Jamie Langenbrunner slapper from the slot, giving the captain his 24th this year.  New Jersey’s top line (and perhaps the NHL’s best?) doubled the lead at 6:01 of the first when Travis Zajac scored his 20th off a rebound just after a power play had come to an end.

Fresh off of IR, Nikolai Khabibulin looked sharp in his second game back for the Hawks, denying the Devils on a flurry of chances in the second period, especially Elias who was stopped a number of times and did one of his patented head to the sky moves after one particularly good glove save.  Then at 16:56 came Gionta’s shorthanded goal (his sixteenth), which seemingly salted away the game in addition to giving Elias the team record for career points and amping up an already intense crowd.

To their credit, Chicago didn’t roll over and just 32 seconds after Gionta’s goal with the crowd still going nuts, Cam Barker scored on that power play, making it 3-1 and ending any dreams of shutout number 101 which admittedly I felt was going to happen, especially with some of the saves Brodeur was making early - but you can’t have everything all the time. 

Things got nasty in the third period after Langenbrunner took a hooking penalty on Kris Versteeg, who was called for diving and then someone – maybe Versteeg himself, I couldn’t tell - proceeded to sucker-punch the Devils captain in the back of the head without being punished for that.  A few minutes later, Mike Rupp and Ben Eager threw down in the inevitable tussle before Eager dragged Rupp to the ice and as one Devil fan put it, ‘Everyone was standing up except for Gary Bettman (who was in attendance because of the historical significance of Brodeur’s impending accomplishment)’.  Now there’s a surprise.

Around the fights, there was still a pretty good hockey game being played although it should have been put away early in the third period when Elias scored, but a super-quick whistle before the puck went in disallowed the goal.  Instead of it being 4-1 and a walk in the park, Dustin Byfuglien scored on a slapshot with 2:03 left to make things more interesting than everyone had bargained for at 3-0.  However, there would be no denying Brodeur and the Devils on this night as they held on for the historic victory.

After the game, his teammates went to greet him and bang their sticks on the ice as Brodeur took a lap around the ice, acknowledged the crowd a few times and all the while proceeding to take a souvenir – the net which he guarded twice tonight and countless other times as a Devil, as he (with help from Kevin Weekes and others) cut it off very carefully for what will surely be one of the most prized souvenirs of his illustrious career.     

Notes: In the only downer of the night, Colin White left the game after playing less than five minutes with another lower body injury.  Or is it upper?  I could care less, I just hope Whitey’s back in plenty of time for the playoffs.  On a night of record accomplishments, the Devils won their tenth straight home game, extending an already current record. 

BoNY Three Stars:

1. Martin Brodeur (30/32 saves)
2. Patrik Elias (assist, +1)
3. Zach Parise (two assists, +2)