Rangers Suffer First Loss of the Preseason to NJ Devils

Well, that did not go as planned. The preseason winning streak is no more.

The New York Rangers has suffered its first loss of the year. The Rangers, now 3-1 in preseason play, fell by a goal differential of two to the New Jersey Devils. This marked the Devils first win of the season, now holding a 1-4 record.

The Devils scored two goals in the first and one in the final frame, both were breakaways off of a stretch pass by Max Willman and Samuel Laberge, respectively.

Most interesting on the Devils side came from who was on the ice. The main Devils' roster is in Prague for the Global Series.

Despite having most of New Jersey's big names in Prague, the Devils still managed to close out the 3-1 win.

The silver lining of the night came from Anton Blidh who found the back of the net in the final frame off of a rebound, with Adam Erne and Brett Berard being credited with assists.

Also on the statsheet was Berard and Blidh both posting four total shots on goal, followed by three from Adam Edstrom and two from both Victor Mancini

The other silver lining of the night came from Jonathan Quick. Quick, possibly the lone Rangers player in Newark expected to be on the opening-night roster, was peppered with 28 shots behind a mostly AHL-bound roster in a 3-1 preseason loss to the Devils at Prudential Center.

Clearly, with players like Jack Hughes, Dougie Hamilton and Dawson Mercer missing from the ice, the Rangers should have been able to pull out a win.

But they didn't.

To be fair, Devil's goaltender Jeremy Brodeur had one hell of a night. He posted a save percentage of .967 off of 30 shots against, only allowing in one.

Perhaps Brodeur is the son of the three-time Stanley Cup champion, Martin Brodeur, for a reason.

Missing from the ice for the Rangers was forward Jimmy Vesey. He exited yesterday’s practice with a lower-body injury sustained during drills, with no clear information about the extent of the issue.

Perhaps should he have been available, the rest would have been different. And yet here we are. Thus, we must turn to what's next.

These two teams meet again tomorrow at Madison Square Garden. The Rangers are expected to dress more of a NHL roster compared to tonight's.

Hopefully the improved roster would bode well for the Rangers on Tuesday, as the Devils will still be using what can be considered a JV squad as the rest will still be in the Czech Republic.

Not splitting the series is paramount. Hopefully the Garden brings the Rangers a turnaround. Puck drop is set for 7 p.m. sharp EST and the game will be available for streaming on Max.