Amid a flurry of trade deadline activity, the New Jersey Devils are still struggling to improve their playoff status in the Eastern Conference.
Meanwhile, the Philadelphia Flyers’ postseason hopes continue to fade with the team mired in another extended slide.
The Devils will look to avoid losing four in a row while trying to hand the host Flyers their fourth consecutive defeat on Sunday afternoon.
New Jersey, which sits in third place in the Metropolitan Division, is 9-14-3 in its past 26 games and has been outscored 12-4 during its three-game slide.
The Devils had no defensive answer during Friday’s 6-1 home loss to Winnipeg, which came hours after acquiring veteran forwards Cody Glass and Daniel Sprong and established defensemen Brian Dumoulin and Dennis Cholowski.
“We had a goal to try and add to the team, certain positions,” Devils general manager Tom Fitzgerald said.
“We thought that the bottom-6 area was something we could try to add some speed, some size and a little more depth.”
Depth will be key for the Devils, who recently lost star Jack Hughes (shoulder) for the season. Dougie Hamilton (lower-body injury) will miss “extended time” and fellow key blueliner Jonas Siegenthaler (lower-body injury) is not slated back until the playoffs.
“No Jack Hughes, but we’re not a one-man team,” Fitzgerald added. “No Dougie Hamilton, but we’re not a one-man defense corps.
“We’re a good team. Our team realizes that when you play a committed, defensive game, you give yourself a chance every night.”
New Jersey has lost three of its past four games on the road, where it fell 4-2 at Philadelphia on Jan. 27. However, the Devils beat the Flyers 5-0 at home two days later for their first win in three games on the season series.
Dawson Mercer had a goal in that victory for New Jersey and also scored Friday. Teammate Timo Meier has just four points in 11 games since he recorded a goal with two assists in those two January games versus Philadelphia.
Philadelphia strung together a 4-0-1 stretch that spanned the 4 Nations Face-Off break and followed a 1-6-1 rut. The Flyers answered their recent run of good fortune by getting outscored 14-5 in losing three straight games. Those losses opened a seven-game stretch at home, where the Flyers dropped consecutive 4-1 contests to Winnipeg and Seattle, and also lost 6-3 to Calgary.
“We’ve got to keep working at our game,” Philadelphia coach John Tortorella said. “It’s going the wrong direction. As each game has gone by, we’ve gotten worse, so we’ve just got to keep working at our game. We have another chance (on Sunday).”
Flyers captain Sean Couturier lamented the team’s play late in the second period.
“Giving up a goal late in the period is tough, and we gave up two there,” Couturier said. “I think it’s not just that, it’s before that. All game long we gave up a lot of odd-man rushes, we weren’t above the puck. It was ugly.”
Flyers rookie forward Matvei Michkov had an assist on Owen Tippett’s goal to boost his point total to 11 (four goals, seven assists) in his past seven games.
–Field Level Media
