Before this game, I expected the New Jersey Devils to be blown out by the Calgary Flames. I’m going to keep it real. I had next to no expectations of the Devils getting anything in the standings out of this game. Consider the situation: The Calgary Flames are first in the Western Conference and second only to Tampa Bay in the league standings. The New Jersey Devils are racing for the bottom end of those standings. The Calgary Flames entered the Rock with six straight wins. The Devils have won six games in all of February. The Calgary Flames iced a roster of twelve forwards who are all arguably NHL-caliber players. The New Jersey Devils only had three to five NHL-caliber forwards active tonight; and placed defenseman Egor Yakovlev at wing to fill out four lines. at wing to fill out four lines. The Calgary Flames have historically dumped on the Devils. Thanks to reader NJD1017 in the Gamethread for pointing it out. The Devils did get nothing in the standings tonight; they still lost in regulation. However, instead of eating a decisive loss where the team gets outplayed for sixty minutes or seeing yet another loss by four or more goals, the Devils lost in a close game by a score of 1-2. There were some areas where they were out-classed, such as the first and second periods in general. But the Devils tried their best and proved to not be doormats to a Calgary squad riding a winning streak. I have seen a healthier New Jersey team suffer bigger and far worse losses than this one this season. I did not like those losses as a viewer, as a fan, and as someone who had to write about it. Tonight, I did not hate this loss. I was pleasantly surprised that a Devils squad filled of almost as many players from Binghamton as New Jersey players did not get blown out by a hot Flames team. It helped a little that Calgary played last night. It helped much more that Mackenzie Blackwood put in a great performance. Not that the Flames created scoring chance after scoring chance, but they ran up 35 shots on net, 58 attempts, 23 scoring chances, and 9 high-danger chances in all situations per Natural Stat Trick. The Flames out-did the Devils in all four categories. (The Devils generated a total of 40 attempts, 20 shots, 16 chances, and 5 high-danger chances.) But Blackwood was able to prevent a lot of those shots from becomign problematic rebounds and broken plays that tend to lead to goals against. Blackwood was dialed in, for lack of a better term. The two goals that beat him were a fluke bounce from an Elias Lindholm pass off Sami Vatanen’s skate and getting deked out his pads by Mark Giordano, who had a wide, wide open path to the net. I would call the Giordano goal against as Blackwood’s lone blemish of the night. It was a great night for someone who made his first start for New Jersey since February 2. If nothing else, we can be happy that the Devils goaltenders may no longer be nightly liabilities. The penalty killers also did a very good job all things considered. The Devils went into trouble with penalties, largely thanks to Blake Coleman. Coleman, New Jersey’s most threatening PK forward, took three minor penalties during the game with the first one happening during a penalty kill for Damon Severson’s tripping penalty in the first period. The Devils technically survived the 3-on-5 situation; Lindholm’s fluke goal occurred just as Severson stepped on the ice. But the penalty killers finished the night even in goals when Kevin Rooney forechecked Johnny Gaudreau, stole the puck from him, curled to the right circle, and ripped a shot past David Rittich. It was Rooney’s first shorthanded goal in the NHL and it put the Devils within a goal - which held up all the way to the end. Out of four power plays, the Devils conceded seven shots on net, which includes that fluke bounce of Vatanen’s skate. The 3-on-5 maintained their form and kept the Flames to one shot on net despite a long-ish two-man advantage. The other penalty kills averaged two shots against each and Blackwood got all of them with relative ease. The Devils could have been sunk by the PK tonight but that didn’t happen. The goal by Rooney represented the kind of effort the Devils displayed tonight. So did the third period. After mustering only ten shots in the first two periods, the Devils put up ten in the third period alone. They drew two power plays and did not entirely waste them. After allowing 22 shots in 5-on-5 play in the first two periods, the Devils kept the Flames to only five. The Devils were skating a bit harder, the Flames showed a little more fatigue (they did play and beat the Isles last night), and they forced Rittich and their defense to react rather than do as they wish. Even at the end of the game, Vatanen blocked two empty-net attempts and the team pushed forward. The Devils did not find an equalizer but they at least tried when most would have understood if they did not. Most of the time, I do not like writing about “moral victories” if only because actual victories are superior. Achievement feels better than being consoled. But the 2018-19 Devils have nothing to play for, the team is loaded with injured players, and they have been forced to go deep into their Binghamton lineup to a point where most of the Bingo forwards are actually Adirondack forwards. They could have been wrecked by Calgary. On paper, they probably should have been. They didn’t. The Devils are playing for pride and they succeeded tonight with a 1-2 loss to Calgary. The Game Stats: The NHL.com Game Summary | The NHL.com Event Summary | The NHL.com Play by Play Log | The NHL.com Shot Summary | The Natural Stat Trick Game Stats The Opposition Opinion: Check out Matchsticks and Gasoline for a Calgary-based perspective on tonight’s game. The Game Highlights: From NHL.com, here are tonight’s highlights. The Worst Kind of Event: Early in the third period, Mirco Mueller and Travis Zajac pushed forward for a 2-on-1. Mueller passed it across, Zajac recovered the puck and sent the puck back in the hopes of Mueller tapping it in by the right post. The puck got away from the rushing Mueller, Michael Frolik was backchecking him, and then something terrible happened. Mueller’s skate seemingly got caught up, his knee buckled, and so he crashed head first into the endboards. Play was immediately stopped, Mueller barely moved, and the players on the ice immediately called for medical attention. The crowd was silent, the rink was silent, the broadcasters were speaking in a low voice, and everyone was hoping for something positive. For a while, only Mueller’s skates moved as he lied facedown on the ice in a lot of pain. Mueller had to be stretchered off the ice. It was an ugly accident. Frolik really didn’t push or guide Mueller into the endboards. The defenseman was pushing forward on offense. He needed to skate hard towards the post to allow for Zajac to pass it back for a scoring opportunity. The cause was that the toe of his skate got stuck in and he could not adjust his body to avoid a serious crash. It was a scary sight. It was not intentional either. I can provide some good news. On the broadcast, Salvador saw Mueller give a thumbs-up from the stretcher as he was wheeled off the ice. After the game, John Hynes commented in his post-game press conference that Mueller was aware and had use of all of his extremities. The Devils’ official Twitter account provided a similar update: #NJDevils news: Mirco had full feeling and movement in his extremities. He was alert oriented and conscious. Taken to University Hospital for further evaluation. — New Jersey Devils (@NJDevils) February 28, 2019 I hope that Mueller’s injury ends up being much more minor than what was feared while he was lying prone on the ice. The Return of Vatanen: Anyone returning from injury to the Devils these days is definitely a positive. Defenseman Sami Vatanen returned to action after suffering a concussion. Vatanen was thrown right into a lot of minutes. He finished the night with 22:12 of ice time including 2:23 on the power play and 4:02 on the penalty kill, including 3-on-5 time. Vatanen’s performance was sort-of OK, I guess. It is hard for me to point to anything particularly good that he did aside from blocking two empty-net attempts by Calgary. Vatanen took two attempts and both were blocked out such that Vatanen had to scramble back to defend. In 5-on-5 play, when Vatanen was on the ice, the Devils were out-attempted 10-14 and out-shot 6-10. However, the Devils out-chanced the Flames 5-4 with Vatanen on the ice and high-danger chances were limited to just one against between the two teams. That is positive if not easily identifiable; those numbers were far from the worst tonight. I did like how Vatanen performed on the penalty kill. The Lindholm goal was a bad break. I can appreciate how important he is seen on the blueline by Hynes and his staff. If there were better defenders, then perhaps he could have received fewer minutes and been more effective. But Vatanen was not awful, not at all a liability, and far from the worst Devil on the ice tonight. I suppose that’s a good return as any. Blake, Blake, Blake: This was an awful night for Blake Coleman. He took three penalties that he did not need to take. His first one was costly if only for putting the Devils down two men for over a minute. While the Devils killed the other two and Rooney scored on one of those, giving a mostly-healthy and streaking Calgary team multiple power plays is never a good thing. Coleman was given two more minutes after regulation ended for beefing with Travis Hamonic. But the night was worse than just taking calls and having issues with other players. When Coleman was on the ice in 5-on-5 play, the Devils were out-attempted 11-22, out-shot 7-13, out-chanced 6-9, and out-high-danger chanced 0-4. No other Devil witnessed more than 20 attempts against in 5-on-5 play tonight. Calgary put up 43 attempts in 5-on-5 play so Coleman saw nearly half of them. Mikael Backlund and Matthew Tkachuk in particular ate his proverbial lunch tonight. As for offense, Coleman did not provide much in the way of offense outside of passing the puck to others for shots. He had zero shots in the game. He attempted zero shots in the game. Coleman has had a lot of good nights with the Devils in 2018-19. This was not one of them. And yet because he was one of the few NHL-caliber players available at forward, Coleman played 22:08 tonight. Only Vatanen and Andy Greene played more than he did. So his lack of contributions were quite noticeable. About the Giordano Goal Against: Blackwood bit on Giordano’s deke hard and so looked silly when the defenseman easily went around Blackwood’s left pad for a score. However, the real issue came before then. Gaudreau saw Giordano enter the zone on the right side with no one there. For some reason, Nico Hischier moved to the center of the zone. Connor Carrick, who was deeper in the zone, stayed in the center, veering left. Gaudreau made a great read and Giordano had an even better finish. It was created by a breakdown in coverage. Hischier did not have such a great night either. It was not nearly as bad as Coleman’s game. Hischier had three shots, won most of his draws, and had some good backchecks like denying a potential breakaway for Gaudreau from behind whilst Coleman took a penalty behind the play in the second period. But Hischier could not carry a bad Coleman and Nick Lappin, who looked slower than Drew Stafford tonight, to good things. Which is understandable given the situation. Did Anyone on the Devils Do Well in 5-on-5?<doc-sep>February’s games end tonight. The final full month of the season awaits. But first, the last Canadian team to come to the Rock this season. The Matchup: The New Jersey Devils vs the Calgary Flames (SBN Blog: Matchsticks and Gasoline) The Time: 7:00 PM ET The Broadcast: TV - MSG+; Digital Audio - The “Devils Hockey Network.” A.K.A. Go to Radio.com or NHL.com for an audio feed. The Song for the Evening: It would be easy to pick a song about fire, flames, heat, burning, and so forth. So instead here is a song about fruit. Specifically, “Peaches” by The Presidents of the United States of America from their self-titled album. Lookout for those ninjas. The Rules: The rules remain the rules even though, seriously, ninjas are trying to jump dudes for goofy rock songs about peaches so be careful out there. (And you will at this site. By the way, spare me your complaints about the theme night, you were saying nothing about the others.) Please keep your comments clean, legal (read: no streams, no links to streams, no asking for streams, no streams), and all about the games itself. Just as importantly, let’s respect each other. There’s no need for drama or being unwelcoming of your fellow Devils fan. This is a Gamethread, let’s focus on the game. Thank you for reading. Go Devils!<doc-sep>
Calgary Flames @ NJ Devils, 5 PM MT, Prudential Center, Newark NJ TV: SN1 Radio: Sportsnet 960 Calgary Flames 40-16-7 (87 pts) - NJ Devils 25-30-8 (58 pts) NHL Standings The Flames will make their final East Coast stop of 2018-19, short of an appearance in the Stanley Cup Finals, with a visit to NJ to take on the Devils Wednesday night. Calgary has won six straight and now have a five point lead in both the Pacific Division and Western Conference over the San Jose Sharks. The Flames resurgence has come on the back of great goaltending. Mike Smith has taken his mid season struggles and put them behind him, having won five of the six games during the current winning streak. He’s also gotten the Flames at least a point in the last six games he’s started as well. Not to be lost in this is David Rittich’s solid start against Ottawa Sunday night either. Calgary appears to have both of their goalies playing well at just the right time and things are looking good overall. Not looking good are the NJ Devils. Jersey sits in last place in the Metropolitan Division and 14th overall in the East. Just for the sake of saying it, the Devils are in 8th place when it comes to the WC in the East, a herculean 16 points behind the Penguins who hold the final spot. In essence, NJ’s season is done. The Devils are 18th in the league in goals scored, which isn’t terrible, but their goaltending is. New Jersey’s 211 goals allowed is 4th worst in the league and their PP barely cracks the top 20. The Flames have owned the Devils over the years, compiling a 66-26-11 record against NJ. Calgary is one of the NHL’s best teams on the road and they’ve been solid at the Pru lately. The Flames have won four out of their last five meetings against the Devils at their home rink. Starting Goalies (E=Expected, C=Confirmed) Flames: Rittich (E): 21-5-5, 2.61 GAA, .912 Save% Devils: Schneider (E): 4-8-2, 3.26 GAA, .898 Save% Team Leaders Flames: Goals- Gaudreau (30), Points- Gaudreau (80), PIM- Bennett (81), Save%- Rittich (.912) Devils: Goals- Palmieri (26), Points- Palmieri (48), PIM- Wood (72), Save%- Blackwood (.926) What’s Happening With The Opposition? NJ Devils Coverage: All About The Jersey Last Time Out Calgary Flames 3 - NY Islanders 1 NJ Devils 2 - Montreal Canadiens 1 Players To Watch Calgary Flames Mikael Backlund (C): 17G - 21A, 8 points in last 6 games NJ Devils Travis Zajac (C): 14G - 22A, 4 points in last 5 games