Practice is good, but nothing replaces the feeling of actual game reps. This is especially true for the New Jersey Devils’ veterans, as they are limited to playing just two pre-season games under the new CBA. But while the core has been intact for several years now, there are a handful of new players who need all the opportunities they can get to build chemistry with their teammates.

Monday night, at Prudential Center, the Devils hosted the New York Rangers in the second game of a pre-season home back-to-back set. The Garden Staters vanquished the Islanders Sunday afternoon, 2-1. Against the Blueshirts, the result was a 3-2 Devils’ victory. That result was made possible by strong play from the line of Timo Meier, Nico Hischier and Luke Evangelista. In addition, Jack Hughes scored the game-winning goal with 2:12 left in the third period.

Jake Allen started in net for the Devils before yielding the crease to Nico Daws for the second and third periods. Meanwhile, the Rangers went with Dylan Garand in net. Allen stopped all three shots he faced while Daws saved 13 of 15. Garand played the entire game and stopped 28 of the 31 shots he faced.

For the Devils, not only was the Meier-Hischier-Evangelista line strong, but there were also a lot of eyes on the trio of Anthony Mantha, Evan Rodrigues and Evangelista. That threesome represents the three biggest acquisitions made by new Devils GM Sunny Mehta, who has spent the last several months attempting to fix what went wrong for New Jersey last season.

“From the players’ perspective, they want the repetitions and to find their timing,” Head Coach Sheldon Keefe told the media Monday morning. “They want to get some game conditioning, feel the flow of the game, work through line changes and play on special teams. That’s what we’re looking to see. I think we’ll get a little bit of both…We hope there is some structure within that.”

Mantha is a proven 30-goal scorer and was acquired via free agency in order to provide more top-line scoring, an area the Devils lacked last season while Jack Hughes was injured. 

Rodrigues is a heart-and-soul type player who is versatile enough to play up and down the lineup on any given night. The team is aiming for him to primarily play on the third line while providing grit, hustle, energy and veteran leadership on and off the ice. He was brought over as the key piece of the deal that saw the Devils ship goalie Jacob Markstrom to the Florida Panthers.

Evangelista is the youngest of the trio, just 24-years-old, and has a shiny new five-year contract extension that should keep him in the Garden State for a long time. New Jersey is hoping that he will prove to be a mainstay in the top-six as a steady playmaker; he had 44 assists last season with the Nashville Predators. 

“We want him to be important,” Keefe told Devils’ team digital reporter Amanda Stein on Monday morning. “We want to give him a good opportunity from the get-go here.”

“He’s a very smart player that can finish chances but also create,” Nico Hischier chimed in. “I’m just excited to play with him and it’ll be fun.”

The Devils controlled the pace of play during a fairly tame first period, which was a much better start than their six-penalty first period against the Islanders on Sunday. 

Then, at 11:55 of the second period, Evangelista fed Meier, who found Hischier in the slot. New Jersey’s Captain backhanded the puck and it fluttered off of Garand’s glove for the first goal of the game. 

“He’s got a lot of skill,” Meier said about Evangelista. “He’s hard on pucks. I think, especially playing with Nico (Hischier). I mean, we try to go on, sometimes play a simple game, get in the zone and then try to outwork the other teams. So I think he’s got that extra skill, making plays, but also realizing when he has to put a puck in and crash on some loose pucks.”

4:10 later, Anton Blidh received a pass from Liam Greentree and whipped a shot past Daws, who had entered the game at the start of the second period, beating him to the glove side to tie the game 1-1.

“For me, it’s just a lot of hand-eye coordination stuff,” Daws said regarding how he tried to stay sharp before coming in to the game in the second period. “During the first period, really just staying engaged, not just watching hockey, but thinking of the game, thinking about what’s going on on the ice and just try to keep the mind sharp.”

With 49.6 seconds left in the middle period, Meier intercepted an errant Blueshirts’ pass behind New York’s net and stuffed it past Garand’s left pad to give the Devils a 2-1 lead. 

“I think it’s just reps,” Evangelista said about trying to build chemistry with Meier and Hischier. “Being cerebral, picking up on stuff. Just kind of watching their end. I think, actually, even after the first period, we took a jump and I kind of started to know some things. We simplified a little bit, put pucks in behind, won battles and played in the O-zone a lot more, I thought, from the second and third on out. You don’t want to overthink this stuff. It’s just hockey at the end of the day, but good to click a couple times.”

New York tied the game when Drew Fortescue scored at 7:06 of the third period on a shot from the right circle that beat Daws. 

Finally, with 2:12 left in regulation, Jesper Bratt dropped the puck off for Jack Hughes just inside New York’s blue line. Hughes weaved his way in on Garand and stuffed the puck through the netminder’s five-hole to give the Devils a 3-2 lead. 

“I gotta watch that one back closer, just to see exactly what his role is on the line and different things are happening,” Keefe said about Mantha’s performance alongside Jack Hughes and Jesper Bratt. “But I thought, when he got the puck, he was calm; he looked confident and patient with it. He distributed it out…Creates a little more space for Jack and Bratt to do their thing. 

“But it’s also gonna take him some time to learn…Everybody thinks playing with Jack and Bratt is such a huge opportunity. Those might be two of the hardest guys to play with in The League. They play a game that not very many people in The League play. And it takes a little bit of time. So we’re gonna have to be patient with that one.”

A couple of minutes later, that was all she wrote as the Devils finished off a perfect 2-0 home pre-season slate. Next is a road game Thursday night at Madison Square Garden, when it is expected that the Blueshirts will have more NHL regulars in their lineup.

One thing is certain: if the new guys continue to mesh with the existing core and gain more comfort with each other, this is going to be a tough Devils team to beat.