RWB

Aye, it's not over quite yet for Devils but the two losses to Sens recently is probably going to be costly. Not to mention the stewardship of John MacLean in the first half of the season. Been one hell of a turnaround since January (23-4-2) and started with a blitz of goals in a few games but it's been back to the grind-it-out strategy since then. Still got to play Buffalo next Saturday so have to keep it going and hope they falter to make it a huge game. I've been posted missing here this season due to losing interest in staying up to all hours to watch live. I watched the matches a day or so after instead so didn't want to look in here and see the scores being mentioned as Devils are so popular. Just in the last couple of weeks I've been lured back to the live games. Almost forgot about all those ad breaks as they're edited out of the 'on demand' matches. So, hopefully Kovalchuk > Ovechkin tonight in a major test of character. Spanked them 5-0 on their last visit although they got us 5-1 at their place after that. I wonder if big Steckel can give us a few pointers since he switched from the Caps at the deadline. Retro green kit tonight although not usually that obvious. Anyone else noticed Swedish forward Mattias Tedenby against their team? Doesn't get too many minutes generally but I really enjoy that wee guy (5'9") when he gets a shift. Maybe overdoes it sometimes but he has bags of skill and is pretty elusive. Could make it big I think. Some of the rookies have been regulars now under Lemaire and have done very well. Face-off coming up. Also supporting Islanders and Canadiens tonight. --- Not a good night with all results going badly. Caps 3-0 winners. They out-trapped Devils who had put all the pressure on with 33 shots to Caps dozen or so. Looked tired as it went on and the wind really went from their sails but two nights running the opposition 'keepers have looked good. McElhinney of Sens and Neuvirth of Caps although we seemed to be aiming for his glove tonight. That's Devils' season over for me. Some pride restored over the piece but not reaching the play-offs is poor. Not that they've impressed once there in recent seasons.

Caps at Devils - Top v bottom. We already lost 7-2 in Washington. The score? 5-0 Devils and not even half way through! Maybe the PB for Pat Burns on the shirts tonight has focussed them too? Oh that really should have been 6 as I type. Young goalie actually saves one that looked a cert. So Devils finally looked like a team last game but lost but playing well tonight and getting the goals. Caps look hopeless tonight so far as Devils just go for it. Tedenby looks a cracking player. Skillful and fast. By the way, yet another young player called up by the coach for this game. Looks like he's giving everyone a chance this season. Hedberg in goal is playing well too! Not keen when he's playing the puck behind the net though.

Devils finally win their 1st home game with a 4-3 OT win v Oilers. Man of the moment and my own personal favourite Kovalchuk fired home the winner in OT with a PP goal. Pretty poor penalty call with Kovi, as I like to call him, drawing the alleged foul for a trip. Very lucky. This was also a meeting of the worst powerplay (Devils) v the worst penalty killers. Devils grabbed 2 PP goals! Oilers 6'6" backup goalie Dubnyk made a stunning glove save in this game to deny Mattias Tedenby a 1st ever NHL goal. He went on to get that goal after Vasyunov managed the same feat earlier in the game. The crawl back to credibility may have started but using Oilers as a guage isn't much use!

Been fed up with Kovalchuk and last night was no exception. He offers nothing other than his flashy stick work before losing the puck. He's hopeless just now. His shoot-out attempt v Sabres last night is bound to become famous. On the NHL front-page. Needs time off if this is all he has just now.

Hoping Devils can follow up on their 5-3 win in Chicago with another visit to MSG already a home game with Rangers. Volchenkov back in defence after missing 12 games. Need that extra experience and strength but incredibly we lose White from defence with flu. No "Marty" chants for Rangers fans tonight either. He's out after going off injured in the win the other night. All the same, I still expect the home fans to chant his name. Probably asking too much to win this one. Oh well, 0-3. Looked ok but not enough menace in front of the net. HL in goal was solid for them. Devils have now called up 9 players from Lowell with Steven Gionta starting tonight. Bound to be issues with getting a settled team.

On first viewing I thought the shot went wide as most folk probably did at the time. Just enough of an edge to put it wide. Should've scored though!

Yeah, Devils keep rockin' along. Rock bottom. Thought Devils played well for the most part in the last two games but it's so easily undone with basic errors. Canucks were able to sit in and pick us off with quick well set up counters along with two huge errors. Always looked dangerous though despite what seemed like little possession. Our shots were pretty much hit and hope with just a few good ones. Canucks seemed to have too much time to wind up big slap shots from the blue line as soon as they got set up. Some rookies in defence that are not on their toes at the back and have White, Green & Tallinder not helping them through too well. Kovalchuk isn't adding too much so far. Tries to be flash as much as possible and frankly he looks stupid with his poor decisions at key moments. More needed from him with Parise out the picture. Really need the more experienced injured guys back even if a couple of them were tagged by the fans as good options to get off the wage bill. As with Clyde, I didn't envisage this pre-season.

Atlantic division is upside down! Some going by the Islanders. More so with key players injured. Reminds me of Devils start last season. Speaking of which a 3-0 win in Montreal. Big improvement in all aspects of their game. Sticking by some youngsters which is good with another getting his first start. Taormina has 2 goals and 2 assists now and he's a defender. Vancouver should get tossed out the league by the way. It's just not safe to watch them if their players are prone to wading into the crowd for a fight. Shocking. Must have been some taunt to get that reaction though.

Another game, another defeat for Devils. Familiar story. Pile up the shots in the 1st and struggle to score, cave in during the 2nd and play out the 3rd. Devils and Clyde are some combination this season.

"New York Islanders defenseman James Wisniewski has been suspended for two games and will forfeit $79,268.30 in salary for directing an inappropriate gesture toward New York Rangers forward Sean Avery during Monday's game at Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum. The incident occurred during a stoppage of play in the first period." I didn't know such a thing existed.

Pants. 3-1 Penguins. One or two good signs but overall Devils have a fair bit of work to do. Neither side looked too hot to be honest.

Just saw about half the Islanders game. Gutsy performance to win it 6-4 v Rangers. Score swung round a couple of times with lots of PP goals and the Isles added two more late on with a 5v3 and 5v4 and then finished it with an empty net goal. Couldn't see it in the 2nd period as Rangers dominated and looked very good. Devils up next in a few minutes. Only 6 defenders and 9 forwards listed tonight with a suspension, injuries and the cap situation restricting them. Hope Devils find something on the PP as we can hardly get in over the blue-line never mind shoot. Same as last season. Same struggle on face-offs as well at this early stage. I think Penguins might be looking for a good win after we swept them 6-0 last season. We had 3 wins in 4 versus Caps last season and they put us away when the chances came the other night. Not hopeful.

Has the season started yet? That was a disgrace from Devils tonight. Horrendous defending so Marty rightly got pulled after 2 and Hedberg came on and instantly threw one in the net. Three fights in the closing minutes with only 2 seconds on the clock between each one. The last one was pathetic with Le Blond going for a rookie who wasn't even watching. He'll be getting a suspension I think as it was inside the last 5 minutes. Big Volchenkov was bloodied after he took a puck in the face at 2-1 us or 2-2. Can't remember now. Defence was fragile enough but without him it was porous. Penguins next in the battle of the losers.

Pre-season started then. I even stayed up until 2.30am watching Devils despite them leaving out most of their top players. Need to get into the swing of late nights so starting early! Could've been worse, I packed it in after the 3rd period at 3-3! 4-3 SO loss to Flyers in the end. Two fights for Pierre-Luc Letourneau-Leblond. I suppose you need to practice everything! ESPN emailed me to sign up early for the online streaming again. Did it early last year for £69.99. Probably do it again as you get all the games along with the archive. In saying that it's regular season only. Probably good enough for Devils the way they flop in the 1st round of the play-offs. Flames beat Canucks twice in one day I see. Is that normal? Not the beating them but the playing twice?

Kovalchuk Not very Devils like to do this! Thought Kings would get him after he'd apparently got down to the nitty-gritty of a contract with them. Cap hit is about $6m a year I think but this is based on rumours of a 17 year deal! Not ratified with league yet either. Never mind.

FREE AGENCY: Looks like Devils are winding the clock back a bit and getting bigger physical players (veterans) in. Jason Arnott returns. Hopefully that improves the face-off issues. Couple of more rugged defenders in (Volchenkov & Tallinder) and Paul Martin is a Penguin now. Hope that works out for the Devils. Devils still intend to get Kovalchuk. Jokinen to Calgary. Can't see him doing much up there.

Having had a weekend to think about things seems to have had an effect at Devils. Jacques Lemaire 'retires' and not too many tears from the fans.

Devils sign off in the 1st round for the 3rd year running. Dreadful stuff from a disjointed team due to the ridiculous amount of changes to the lines between & during games. Flyers better in so many ways but it was ugly with a staggering amount of penalties for both sides in the 5 games. Flyers had 37 penalties against them (32 short-handed) and Devils wouldn't be far behind I suspect. No wonder Flyers players keep getting injured with all the powerplays to defend (which they did very well). Tough team. Just wish Carcillo was the guy getting crocked instead of the guys that did. Kovalchuck was a luxury as far as I'm concerned and simply didn't fit in at Devils, however GM Lamoriello wants him to stay. Devils suck Enjoy your hockey. I'll enjoy some earlier nights now!

The first time I saw that Hudler picture in the NHL game I thought of the blue faced guy. Hey, just the way my mind works sometimes. I purposely refuse to sign him on from free agency because of it though. Maybe the aliens you saw erased your memory? They can do that you know. I asked them not to though, so I was fine.

Devils in cruise control in the 1st round v Flyers. Pity really, because I expected them to at least try and win. 8 power plays each in the last meeting. Says it all. Defence is awful and so easily forced into mistakes behind their net.

That Hudler looks like an alien in NHL 10. Anyway, 1st period at Flyers tonight is littered with penalties already. 3 in the first 7 minutes for them for a start. 1-1 on goals.

This is looking bad for Devils again at end of 1st. Scored short-handed to lead, Flyers equalise with a rare shot. Then Clarkson gets penalised for a fair last ditch diving poke check and Flyers score the pp. Shocking decision to help Flyers again although defence needs to take a look at itself. Footage already showed that Flyers winner in game 1 was when they had 7 men on the ice. It's hard enough beating this mob without simple decisions like those going against us. That said, Flyers have been efficient and made the most of their chances when they get them. Edit: 5-3 win after taking a pile of penalties in the 2nd and coming back to earn it. Missed plenty of very good chances all night and were our own worst enemy. Exciting game. Flyers still haven't got going yet but are still making it tough going for Devils.

Some start to the play-offs. All one goal wins and only 3 home sides winning game 1. Flyers will take Devils out as that's 6 defeats in 7 to them now this season and they didn't to much offensively against Devils the other night to win it.

I wasn't convinced about that. They knocked it back behind their goal from near their blue line once but I think that was more a case of not wanting to cause a turnover and end of season. Devils secured 2nd spot in the east with a 2-1 win tonight. We now have to face Flyers who've won 5 out of 6 meetings this season. Has to count for something but I think the Devils have stepped it up a bit lately with the power play/kill much improved. Brodeur has been strange in recent games giving up crazy chances going behind his goal. Flyers didn't look great tonight (lots of broken plays from both sides) but given the nature of the game that's not surprising. Once they scored the place came to life and it seemed they were bound to win. Rangers keeper was the reason they were still in it even from early on. Good fightback by Isles tonight. Back to 4-5 v Pens. Scratch that. 5-5!

Flyers and Rangers down to a shoot-out to see who makes it in. Flyers make it with Jokinen missing when it mattered. Se we get Bruins or Flyers depending on our result v Sabres. I'm thinking maybe we throw it tonight to get Bruins! Just as I update this Sabres score.