On Tuesday night, the New Jersey Devils completed the second half of a western Canada back-to-back with another win, a 2-1 win over the Edmonton Oilers at the Rogers Center.
They are halfway through their Pacific Northwest road trip after defeating the Calgary Flames 2-1 in OT on Monday. They will go on to play the Vancouver Canucks on Friday, Jan. 23 followed by the Seattle Kraken on Sunday, Jan. 25.
Jake Allen was in goal for the Devils, his first start since a 4-3 loss vs the Winnipeg Jets on Jan. 11, breaking a streak of four straight starts for counterpart Jacob Markstrom. He moved to 12-11-1 on the season with the victory, making 21 saves on 22 shots.
Tristan Jarry got the nod on the other end, his sixth start for the Oilers since being traded to Edmonton from the Penguins on Dec. 12. It was his first game in front of the home crowd in Edmonton as an Oiler. With the loss, he fell to 13-4-2 on the year and 4-1-1 since joining the Oilers.
It was a milestone night for multiple skaters, too, with Devils star center Jack Hughes playing in his 400th game and old friend Curtis Lazar picking up his 600th, now suiting up in orange and blue. It was also Devils forward Lenni Hämeenaho’s second NHL game after skating his rookie lap last night in an impressive debut in Calgary, while Edmonton’s Ryan Nugent-Hopkins played in his 1,001st career game, having earned his silver stick in the Oilers’ last game on Sunday, Jan. 18, a 5-0 drubbing of the St. Louis Blues.
Furthermore, it was the first game all season the Devils were without defenseman Luke Hughes, who suffered an ugly shoulder injury in the second period on Monday vs the Flames. He joined Stefan Noesen and Zac MacEwen on the Devils disabled list, with Jonathan Kovacevic returning to the lineup.
Edmonton had three players out of the lineup as well, forwards Kasperi Kapanen, former Devils playoff hero Adam Henrique and star center Leon Draisaitl, who is in his native Germany for personal reasons. With so many key attacking pieces unavailable, Oilers head coach Kris Knoblauch favored an 11-forward, 7-defense setup for Tuesday’s matchup.
First Period
The game started incredibly slowly, with each team only managing one shot apiece through the first nine minutes and change. The Devils applied an aggressive forecheck around the midway point of the first period but couldn’t register a shot on goal, despite pinning the Oilers in their own end for minutes at a time. Timo Meier had the best look for New Jersey, firing a one-timer wide on an odd-man rush.
Defenseman Brett Pesce had a great look in the slot for New Jersey on a centering feed from Cody Glass, but the shot was kicked aside by Jarry, just his second save of the game 12 minutes in.
The Oilers nearly drew first blood with just under seven minutes to go in the first, when Mattias Ekholm fired a one-timer into Allen’s pad. The 35-year-old netminder held strong in the opening frame, making four saves on four shots on goal.
The most exciting moment of the period game at the 2:49 mark when Vasily Podkolzin and Kovacevic threw hands after the Devils defenseman hit star player Connor McDavid with a hit up high. Kovacevic only received a five-minute major for fighting, while Podkolzin took an additional two-minute minor for instigating and a subsequent ten-minute misconduct, reducing Edmonton to 10 forwards well into the second period.
The Devils couldn’t capitalize on the man-advantage, showcasing a toothless powerplay if not for a single shot from the slot by Dawson Mercer that needed to be lifted a bit higher to beat Jarry.
Shots ended 4-4 after 20. New Jersey were clearly the better team in the frame, but couldn’t find a way to score. Stop me if this sounds familiar.
Second Period
The second period also took a bit to get going, with the Devils slowing the game down early in the frame with a number of icings. Matthew Savoie had the first decent look of the period, as he nearly tapped home a feed in front of the net about four minutes in, but couldn’t connect cleanly with the puck. Down the other end, Paul Cotter posed a bit of a threat with a nifty power move that Jarry denied.
Finally, the Devils broke through with 14:37 to play in the second frame as Arseny Gritsyuk fired home a backhand pass from Cody Glass. Good pressure again from the newly formed Gritsyuk-Glass-Hameenaho line, but it really should have been stopped by Jarry, seemingly trickling through his midsection. It was the first goal conceded by Edmonton in 151:41 of game time, having posted shutouts in each of their last two games.
However, the lead didn’t last long for New Jersey, as Savoie deflected a Jake Walman shot past Allen just 1:39 later. It looked like there may have been a high-stick, but the goal was given after a quick review.
But just minutes later, that same line for the Devils came up big once again, as Glass fired home a beautiful one-time snapshot for his fourth tally in six games, taking advantage of an irresponsible Darnell Nurse line change. Gritsyuk and Connor Brown, in his first game back in Edmonton after two seasons as an Oiler, picked up the assists with 11:28 to play in the second.
Things would get harder for New Jersey, as Brenden Dillon picked up a delay of game minor shortly thereafter at the 10:08 mark. Despite putting the league’s best powerplay on the ice (33.1%) for two minutes, the best look came from the Devils as Brown and Glass mounted a two-on-one but were denied by a save-of-the-year candidate by Jarry.
The Devils took another penalty at 5:50 when Jonas Siegenthaler tripped Savoie, but the powerplay would be swiftly interrupted by a pair of offsetting penalties between Brown and McDavid, who tied each other up in the neutral zone. Brown went for an interference and McDavid went for a hold with 5:00 to go, the former teammates exchanging unpleasantries on their way to their respective penalty boxes.
Missing Draisaitl and, for at least a couple of minutes, McDavid, the Oilers were not able to flex their special teams muscles quite as much as they normally do. That said, the Devils’ penalty kill continued to look strong as it has of late, killing 21 of their last 24 penalties (87.5%) through the second period on Tuesday night.
The Devils finished the second with a deserved but fragile 2-1 lead. They led the period in shots 10-5 and 14-9 through 40 minutes.
Third Period
The Oilers looked to turn up the pace to start the final frame, with McDavid nearly finding a wide open Nugent-Hopkins in front of the net within two minutes of the period’s opening faceoff. The Devils were lucky that the longest tenured Oiler fanned on the puck as Dougie Hamilton had vacated his defensive assignment in the process.
The refs missed what should have been a high-sticking call on Spencer Stastney around the five-minute mark when he caught Meier up high. That would be the least of New Jeresy’s issues though, as they gave up a litany of chances just a minute later.
Podkolzin was unleashed on a breakaway after spending much of the second period in the box, but was denied by Allen’s best save of the night. The chance was followed up by an arguably better look for Zach Hyman, who fired a short-side shot into the post. Hyman’s 17 goals in his last 20 games ahead of Tuesday night makes him one of the hottest scorers in the league. Allen denied Hyman on a similarly dangerous chance just moments later, this time from the opposite circle.
The first half of the third period was all Edmonton, with the Oilers outshooting New Jersey 7-0 through the opening ten minutes of the frame. As the minutes trickled down, the Oilers turned up the heat, tallying four more shots in the next 2:30, spending seemingly the entire period in the Devils zone.
The Devils only registered one shot in the first 18 minutes of the final frame, a breakaway wrister by Brown that Jarry shrugged aside with just under five minutes remaining. New Jersey added a couple more shots later in the period off the sticks of Hamilton and Meier, two good lucks in transition that Jarry denied.
The Oilers pulled Jarry with 1:30 left and mounted their final push, bombarding Allen and the New Jersey defense with extra traffic in front of the net. Pesce put himself on the line, blocking an Ekholm slapshot from point-blank range right after Siegenthaler denied Jack Roslovic an open-net look with a goalie-like left kick save. The Devils held on for their fourth win in five games, a gutsy team victory.
The Devils defense and Allen shined on Tuesday night. Absorbing a lot of pressure late, 12 of Allen’s 21 saves came in the third period. The Devils blue-liners bent but never broke, limiting a potent Edmonton offense to just 22 shots, if not for a few grade-A looks that Allen bailed them out on.
A game that would generally be billed as Hughes vs McDavid, the star players went quiet tonight. Glass and Gritsyuk continued their line’s success, both collecting two points en route to a crucial win. McDavid’s 17-game point streak was snapped by the Devils, while Hughes’s goalless streak extended to 14 games.
It became just the Devils’ 10th win in the second game of a back-to-back since the start of the 2023-24 season. Despite not registering a shot in the third period, the Devils’ defense weathered the storm and continued their run of strong third period performances when having the lead, improving to 17-0-0 on the season when leading after two periods.
The Devils can keep building some momentum towards an improbable playoff push later this week when they head to Vancouver on Friday, followed by Seattle on Sunday. They’re still sixth in the Metropolitan Division with 54 points, three points behind Pittsburgh for third place.
