Newark. The New Jersey Devils are the undisputed masters of the New York area.
They defeated arch-rivals the New York Rangers by a score of 4-0 in Game 7 of the night at home at the Prudential Center thus continuing into the second round of the Stanley Cup playoffs.
“Good damn,” says goal scorer Jesper Pratt as opposing teammate Mika Zibanejad announces he won’t be playing in the WC.
It’s been said they were the scarred Manhattan stars with experience in gas-hugging Game 7 dramas like the one that culminated in last night’s “Battle of the Hudson River” — and so they’d have a distinct advantage against younger, inexperienced rivals from the neighboring state.
But that was not how the final round of the first round of the Stanley Cup playoffs ended.
seemed taken
The Rangers, with the exception of goalkeeper Igor Systyorkin, looked caught off guard and played nervously and fumbled as the home players moved at lightning speed to send sparks around.
– Yes, we felt we had nothing to lose, says Jesper Bratt when we meet him in a delightful dressing room afterwards.
Before the season, no one thought we’d get this far. We counted everyone out all season and now when it came to the playoffs it said we wouldn’t have enough experience to compete with Rangers. But after the first couple of games, when we were probably a little nervous, we got through the series and we got through that tonight as well.
In the decisive excitement, they took a 2-0 lead in the second half, after fewer than expected goals from champions Michael McLeod and Thomas Tatar .. Then the “blues” tried to create a third push, but they could not get a stunning goalkeeper. Rookie Akira Schmid and when Eric Hola also scored 3-0, it was clear the Devils would win the battle for supremacy on the New York hockey scene.
Damn good, continues Bratten, who also managed to score his first goal in the qualifiers this year with an empty net at the end of the game.
– Nice to see a disc go in at the end. Hopefully that goal means he’s going to ease up on that point but the important thing for me is to help the team win in every way and I think I did that by making sure the best Rangers players didn’t get too many chances.
The Devils will actually play on Wednesday
The 24-year-old from Trångsund now gets a chance to use the same skills against the Carolina Hurricanes in a series that starts Wednesday night.
– Yeah, we’ll hop on board early Tuesday. It’s great, says Bratten, so you don’t have to go and wait.
– We’re so excited, it’s going to be so much fun.
For the Rangers, who had great ambitions this year, the season ends much earlier than expected.
But no, that doesn’t mean Mika Zibanejad will appear in a Tree Kronor jersey in the future.
He and his wife, Irma, will soon be first-time parents, so a World Cup is out of the question.
