Home was looking good to the Devils, who returned to the Meadowlands last night once beaten and thrice battered from the unkind road.
Scott Gomez and Colin White joined Jamie Langenbrunner as casualties of the Devils’ 1-1-2 trip, sitting out last night as New Jersey hosted the Coyotes.
Gomez suffered a rib injury in Sunday’s 1-1 tie in Denver, while White absorbed what the Devils are calling a bruised knee that night. Langenbrunner left New Jersey’s 2-0 loss in Dallas on Friday to undergo left knee arthroscopy that will sideline him two to three weeks.
The spate of injuries left the Devils to insert Christian Berglund and Tommy Albelin into last night’s lineup, with Mike Rupp already having moved in when Langenbrunner went out.
With coach Pat Burns reworking his lineup, the Devils sought to snap their three-game overall winless streak, which overlapped their team-record-tying 13-game unbeaten streak, which ended in Dallas.
They still owned an eight-game (7-0-1) home unbeaten streak after they had opened the season winless in their first four home games, their longest winless home start in 20 years.
One constant remained: Martin Brodeur, who had played all but one of their first 22 games (12-4-5) and yesterday was named the NHL’s defensive player of the month for November.
Brodeur went 8-1-3 in November with a startling 1.30 goals-against average, .943 save percentage and three shutouts.
He was sparkling in holding the Avalanche to a tie Sunday, yielding only a 3-on-2 goal to Milan Hejduk, completing a tic-tac-toe play.
Brodeur’s four shutouts this season gave him a chance to top his personal best of 10 in a season, on pace for 14.9, and no goalie has had more than 13 since Tony Esposito’s 15 in 1969-70. Dominik Hasek had 13 in 1997-98.
With Corey Schwab still idled with a groin injury, Scott Clemmensen continued as Brodeur’s backup, ensuring Brodeur a heavy workload.
They were facing a Coyote team that was on a five-game road trip, having tied in Boston on Sunday. A victory against Los Angeles on Thursday snapped Phoenix’s three-game losing streak, the Coyotes sitting last in the Pacific Division.
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Devils and Marines will collect Toys for Tots tomorrow when Caps visit Meadowlands. . . . Devils will honor Scott Stevens before Jan. 17 afternoon game against Caps for setting an NHL record for games played by a defenseman. He played his 1,619th game last night.
Devils’ farm team, the Albany River Rats, will face the Islanders’ Bridgeport Sound Tigers at 7 p.m. on Jan. 22 in the first-ever AHL game at the Meadowlands. All tickets are $10.
