Cammalleri scores 2 to lead Devils past Hurricanes, 5-1
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) After the New Jersey Devils' latest road win this season, Mike Cammalleri pointed to the balanced effort that led to the victory.
Cammalleri scored twice, backup goalie Keith Kincaid stopped 30 shots, and the Devils beat the Carolina Hurricanes 5-1 Thursday night.
Adam Henrique had his team-leading 12th goal of the season, and Stepehn Gionta and Jacob Josefson each got their first. Cammalleri increased his team-leading points total to 25 as New Jersey won for the second time in three games overall and improved to 8-4 on the road.
''We feel like we accomplished something as a team tonight,'' Cammalleri said. ''The result followed.''
Brad Malone scored for Carolina and Eddie Lack finished with 22 saves. The Hurricanes lost their third straight and fourth in the last five.
''It was a tough night,'' Hurricanes captain Eric Staal said. ''We needed to have more of a competitive edge to our game. It wasn't there to start. We weren't on our toes. We spent more time in our end fighting to get pucks under control and they were more aggressive than we were.''
Cammalleri got the Devils on the scoreboard first with 4:43 left in the first period.
New Jersey then scored twice in a 2:07 stretch in the second. Henrique scored on the power play with just under 9 minutes left in the period. Gionta made it 3-0 with 6:50 remaining - mere seconds after the back end of a double-minor high-sticking penalty to Carolina's Jeff Skinner expired.
Malone got Carolina on the board with just under 2 1/2 minutes left in the period.
Josefson restored the Devils' three-goal lead with 1:03 to go in the second.
Cammalleri capped the scoring with 7:13 left in the third.
Kinkaid said he saw a lot of the shots Carolina threw at him.
''That's a credit to our guys for keeping their shot to the outside,'' Kinkaid said. ''I had one little hiccup but everything else we did out there was spot on.''
New Jersey coach John Hynes said he thought his team played well without Travis Zajac, who went out during the first period with an upper body injury.
''It was important for guys to be able to step up and we played a bit short-handed,'' Hynes said. ''Obviously, Travis is a big loss but I liked the way we responded.''
New Jersey went 1 for 4 on the power play, while Carolina was 0 for 2.
NOTES: The game drew Carolina's second-smallest crowd of the season with an announced attendance of 9,245. ... The Devils put together their first ''Dads' Trip'' and had a total of 84 people in their traveling party to Carolina. ... Hurricanes F Elias Lindholm had his five-game point streak snapped. ... New Jersey's Tuomo Ruutu and Jiri Tlusty didn't get a chance to play against their former team as both were scratches.