The New Jersey Devils didn’t cower at the New York Rangers’ eruption of violence, but they probably came as close to “turning the other cheek” as could be expected in Game 4. The power play disparity illustrates that point most simply: the Devils received six while the Rangers only had one.
Zach Parise’s three-point night is a nice illustration of making another team hurt on the scoreboard more than anything else.
“I think throughout a seven-game series, both teams are bound to get frustrated at different things,” Parise said. “But like Marty said earlier, we’ve done a good job all playoffs of playing whistle-to-whistle and skating away from the scrums and things like that. Whether they’re frustrated or not, I don’t know. But we did a good job of staying out of it.”
That was probably a fairly easy task against the Florida Panthers, but the Philadelphia Flyers likely presented a good primer for this series. Philly isn’t the “bullying” squad it once was, yet it’s still one of the league’s more agitating and bruising squads.
The Devils wisely took the high road - at least in hockey terms - in the semifinals and hope to carry that over in round three. So far, they’ve done a great job of that - from players all the way down to their head coach.