Three weeks ago, the New Jersey Devils saw their fans make their presence loudly felt at Madison Square Garden when they scored the first four goals and rolled to a 5-1 win over the New York Rangers.
While the Devils were already on an upward trajectory, they won the first meeting despite allowing 39 shots on goal.
Recently, the Devils are defensively clamping down on opponents and will attempt to hold a seventh straight foe under 20 shots on goal Monday afternoon when they host the struggling New York Rangers in Newark, N.J.
The Devils and Rangers were separated by seven points heading into their first meeting on Dec. 2 when Jack Hughes scored twice and Jacob Markstrom made 38 saves. Now the Devils lead the Rangers by 14 points by going 5-2-1 in eight games since the first encounter.
The Devils have not allowed more than 24 shots on goal since the first meeting with the Rangers. New Jersey allowed 12 shots on goal in Saturday's 3-0 home win over the Pittsburgh Penguins, tying the longest streak in team history of holding opponents under 20 shots set from March 28-April 8, 1999.
"I think we're a pretty confident group right now," said captain Nico Hischier, who leads the Devils with 17 goals. "We're still trying to get better every day, finding consistency in our game. If you're strong in your defensive zone, you're definitely going to win more games than lose."
The Devils won their 18th game by three goals or fewer on Saturday when Hischier scored and set up goals by Stefan Noesen and Timo Meier.
"We know what we have in this room offensively," defenseman Brenden Dillon said. "It just shows the type of team we can be when we do commit."
The Rangers entered that first meeting with the Devils hoping to get rolling after snapping a five-game losing streak with their 4-3 victory over the Montreal Canadiens on Nov. 30.
Instead, New York is in a 4-12-0 slide and has traded Jacob Trouba and Kappo Kakko to the Anaheim Ducks and Seattle Kraken, respectively, during the skid. New York has been held to two goals or fewer 10 times in their last 16 games.
The latest instance occurred in Sunday's 3-1 home loss to the Carolina Hurricanes. The Rangers took the lead on Jimmy Vesey's goal 17 seconds in but mustered little else offensively.
"It was a good start and then it just slowly slipped away from us," defenseman Adam Fox said. "We couldn't get it back after that."
New York was held to 23 shots on goal and took one shot on its four power plays. The Rangers are 3-for-27 on the power play since scoring three times on the man advantage Nov. 30.
The Rangers allowed two goals in the second period when they were outshot 16-8. New York also allowed five more power plays on Sunday after conceding seven in Friday's 3-1 win over the Dallas Stars.
"Every game at this point is important," defenseman Braden Schneider said. "Especially these division ones. These are the ones you have to make sure you're ready for so we have to move on from tonight. We have to make sure we're ready to go like we were tonight and continue that for 60 minutes."
--Field Level Media
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