Timo Meier scored in his New Jersey debut, Jesper Boqvist recorded his first career two-goal game and Nico Hischier scored 23 seconds into overtime as the visiting Devils beat the Arizona Coyotes 5-4 on Sunday in Tempe, Ariz.
Acquired from San Jose on Feb. 26, and out since Feb. 18 with an upper-body injury, Meier wasted no time getting in good with the Devils’ faithful. Off a Dougie Hamilton shot, Meier found the puck in the slot and slid a backhander around Arizona netminder Connor Ingram just 9:09 into the contest.
However, the Devils blew a two-goal, third period lead and needed Hischier, via a two-one-one surge, to help them improve to 4-0-1 in the last five games. Damon Severson had a goal with an assist for the Devils, who are 19-4-4 since Dec. 30.
Down 4-2, Arizona’s Nick Schmaltz one-timed a perfectly-placed pass from Clayton Keller just 1:29 into the third. Then with two minutes remaining in regulation and amid some net-front traffic, the puck found Jack McBain, who sent it into an open net with New Jersey netminder Vitek Vanecek (25 saves) out of position to tie the contest.
Rookie Matias Maccelli and Zack Kassian also scored for the Coyotes, who got 35 saves from Ingram. However, they have lost three straight and five of six.
While Meier and New Jersey could not have gotten off to a much better start, Arizona made it 1-1 a little more than one minute later when Maccelli converted alone from the slot. The Devils, though, regained the lead with 1:42 remaining in the first when Severson backhanded a cross-slot pass for Boqvist to easily convert.
Severson added his fifth goal just 4:44 into the second period. On the power play, he sent an easy wrister past an apparently screened Ingram for a 3-1 edge.
Arizona got within a goal when Kassian drove the rebound of Liam O’Brien’s shot over the left shoulder of Vanecek with 3:37 remaining in the second. However, Boqvist struck again with 40.3 seconds left in the second from a wide-open spot in the slot off an ideal pass from Ondrej Palat.
–Field Level Media
