New Jersey Devils Beat Philadelphia Flyers To Stop Slide
The New Jersey Devils stopped their four-game losing streak against the Philadelphia Flyers and overall played a pretty good game. They didn’t come out flying but didn’t let in the first goal early as was becoming a tradition. They did a pretty good job defensively against their struggling rival. The hit Michael McLeod took from James van Riemsdyk early was dirty too and should have resulted in a major. He might be getting a call from the league about it. It was fortunate McLeod was not injured in a big way.
The Good
The fourth line was solid all night was by far the best line early on. They had a great physical play with Bastian and Mcleod both having four hits and the transitional play was just top tier for a fourth line. Late in the game, the line had two chances that could have gone in and Bastian’s tip that went between the legs of Hart and sat on the goal line was quite the hand-eye play and would have sealed the game for this team. They were all over the ice in a good way and it was great to see Mcleod get a goal finally thanks to Hughes giving it up to him.
Nico Hischier did a fantastic job killing the Devils penalty in the second period with hard nose hockey and taking it to the corner to kill extra time is something this team doesn’t do often. He completely stalled the momentum of the flyers and took an important 30 seconds on the clock.
Jack Hughes and Yegor Sharangovich being back together almost paid off. They need to stick together. Hughes found Sharangovich in the slot early in the second and he nearly fired it in, looking like last year’s sniper and not this year borderline AHLer. Stay the course with these two and the magic will come again.
Jesper Bratt was pushing the play a lot again with his strong possession game and his shot is sneaky good. He is utilizing it a fair bit more this year and he needs to continue to do so while being the Devil’s main play driver till when Jack is not on the ice.
Dawson Mercer’s goal was a great trip and it was very smart of Smith to fire the puck quickly and in a spot that he could get it instead of trying to pick a corner. He has had a bad year but this looked like last year’s Smith so at least there is a glimmer of hope.
The Bad
Pavel Zacha looked like he had a lucky goal but it was called back on an offside. This play honestly was avoidable and he could have dragged the leg, the games fast but he has to have the awareness. In the third, he also made two bad passes that could have hurt the team, the first being a lazy one at the offensive blueline resulting in a turnover instead of a good chance, and the second the drop pass at the blueline. He has to take the extra split second to think because if the Flyers scored on that drop pass the momentum would have been completely flipped.