Are we finally seeing the end of the Marty Brodeur era in New Jersey? Tonight has been another example of his struggles this season as he gave up 3 goals in the first 8 minutes of the game and was pulled in favor of Johan Hedberg, who did not fare much better in the 6-3 loss. Brodeur was pulled for the 3rd time in the last 6 games. Rod Pelley, Travis Zajac, and Patrik Elias had the goals for the Devils while rookie of the year candidate Jeff Skinner scored twice for Carolina along with Zac Dalpe, Tuomo Ruutu and Sergei Samsonov, who also scored twice. It seems very likely that fans will see Hedberg down the stretch more than Brodeur until he gets his confidence back.
Brodeur allowed the 3 goals on 7 shots and Hedberg made 15 saves on 18 shots. Cam Ward made 25 saves on 28 shots. The Devils trailed 4-0 at one point of the game, but manages to come to life in period 2 and cut it to 4-2, but they still could not recover from their 1st period disaster.
Nick Palmieri played in place of Vladimir Zharkov, which was kind of surprising since Zharkov has played well in recent games. He played with Kovalchuk and Zajac. Kovy was uneventful today just like the entire Devils team for the most part as they could not counteract the Hurricanes speed and loose puck battles. They were two steps behind the plays and the puck. Look for Johan Hedberg to start on Tuesday at home against Minnesota unless Marty has a really good practice.
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