Scoring Summary
1st Period – Nothing
2nd Period
Devils – Travis Zajac (PP) – 7th of the Season, from Parise and Brylin, at 5:31.
Washington – Chris Clark – 13th of the Season, from Zubrus and Semin, at 8:49.
Devils – Patrik Elias – 13th of the Season, from Lukowich and Rafalski, at 18:54.
3rd Period
Devils – Brian Gionta – 14th of the Season, from Gomez and Elias, at 4:51.
Devils – Zach Parise – 12th of the Season, from Brylin and Martin, at 9:52

Game Recap:

I missed most of this one, so I’ll recap the goals, as they were available to me through NHL.com’s “Highlight Machine”. First up, after a scoreless first, Travis Zajac got a sweet pass from Zach Parise right in front. He whiffed at the first chance, battled goalie Brent Johnson to the post and finally knocked it in, 1-0 Devs.

Chris Clark answered for the Capitals. Their CAPtain got a third rebound after Marty had stopped him once, then came across for a whiff-job from Dainius Zubrus, and it came back across to Clark and a diving Marty could not get to it, 1-1.

Patrik Elias answered to that with a deflection goal late in the 2nd stanza. It all started on one of those long rushes that Scott Gomez is known for making, he then sent a pass back for Brian Rafalski, who fed a cross to Brad Lukowich, who shot one toward the net that OUR CAPTAIN deflected to the roof. 2-1.

The Devils pulled away in the third, and Brian Gionta, tonight’s key player in Devils GameDay, finally scored again. Coming in on a 2-on-1 with Gomez, Gionta decided to take it himself. He pulled it to the backhand down-low and beat Johnson on the long side. 3-1.

Finally, the Devs scoring ended with a goal from Zach Parise. THE ZACH walked in down the right wing and simply rifled a wrister to the top right corner. Brent Johnson really never had a chance on one of those plays that makes you think THE ZACH can be a 40-goal scorer someday. 4-1 Final.

Also in the NHL, the Islanders lost 5-1 to Carolina. The clear problem for New York tonight was the rebounds, as every goal (except Scott Walker’s on a DiPi giveaway) was on a 2nd or 3rd or 4th chance.