Devils Split Home-And-Home with Maple Leafs; Eliminated from Playoff Contention

With only four games left in the 2023/24 season, the Devils were faced with a home-and-home series against the Toronto Maple Leafs. The Devils would split the series, with each team winning in the others’ barn.

The loss on Tuesday night, which the Devils dropped 5-2 in front of 16,018 fans at the Prudential Center, would be a costly one as New Jersey would be eliminated from playoff contention. A year after the team made the playoffs for the first time since 2017/18, they found themselves once again not playing games in late April.

New Jersey would actually have a lead in this game, scoring two straight goals after Nick Robertson would open the scoring with his 13th of the season 8:56.

Nico Hischier would get the first thanks to a gorgeous pass from Dawson Mercer as Hischier split the two defenders at the blue line and beat Joseph Woll with a forehand, backhand move for his 27th of the year. Just over five minutes into the second, Mercer would give the Devils the lead on the power-play with his 20th of the season after he deflected Hischier’s slot shot on net and buried the rebound, also on his back hand, past a diving Woll.

The game however would be all about Auston Matthews, who scored his 66th goal of the season passing Alex Ovechkin (65 goals in 2007-08) for the most goals in a season by an active player. Tyler Bertuzzi also had two goals and an assist as the Leafs would improve their record to 6-1-0 in their past seven games.

Interim Devils coach Travis Green said post-game, “I think this has been one of those seasons where there’s been high expectations and things don’t go the way you want. It’s different when you have a veteran team and young team, and you’ve also got a lot of people, key players injured all year. I believe there’s a process to everything.”

The Devils would also announce earlier in the day that forward Jack Hughes underwent shoulder surgery on Wednesday in Colorado and would miss the remainder of the regular season. All indications point to Hughes being 100% when training camp rolls around in September.

With New Jersey officially eliminated from playoffs contention, the team seemed to find themselves a bit more, stunning the Toronto crowd at Scotiabank Arena thanks to a Jesper Bratt game-winning goal with just 1:14 left on the clock.

“At this point of the year, you really want your team to show its identity, and we’ve talked about that since Day One,” coach Green said. “A lot of resiliency in our game tonight. 

In a crazy back and forth game that saw seven lead changes, Bratt and Timo Meier each had two goals and one assist, with the duo combining for the Devils last four goals. Both of Meier’s goals came on the power-play, one off a one-timer from the right circle, the other off a face-off right in the slot just before the second period came to an end.

“That was a fun game to play,” Meier said. “It wasn’t perfect, but effort-wise, I thought we did a great job.”

With 8:57 left in the third period, Bratt would propel the Devils into the lead with their third power-play goal off the game, also with a one-timer from the right circle. John Tavares would tie the game just minutes later, but it would be Bratt who would put the Devils into the lead for good.

Picking up a loose puck after Matthews wrapped the puck around the net, Bratt led a 2-on-3 into the offensive zone. Blowing past Leafs defensemen Joel Edmonson, Bratt cut inside the right circle and fired one past a somewhat screened Ilya Samsonov to give New Jersey the victory.

“We really showed how strong of a team effort we can put in and come back in these really hard, emotional games,” Bratt said. “The game was a fast-paced game, a lot of things happening, a lot of teams coming back and there’s sometimes emotional roller coasters playing teams like this, and we stuck with it and came up with a huge win that we as a team should feel pretty good about.”

Also in the victory, Nolan Foote was able to net first goal of the season after spending a majority of the season on LTIR. Erik Haula would get on the board too, scoring just 21 seconds after Tavares score 18 seconds into the game.

The Devils now have a record of 38-37-5 as they head to Philadelphia tomorrow with just two games left this season as they look to play spoiler against the Flyers, who are looking to keep their playoff hopes alive with any type of win.