Ugly flashback among key Rangers takeaways in 7-1 loss to Devils

It’s not time to jump off the New York Rangers early-season bandwagon just yet. But that 7-1 loss to the New Jersey Devils on Thursday night at Prudential Center certainly was equal amounts embarrassing and concerning.

These Rangers built up quite a bit of goodwill not only by winning six of their first eight games here in the 2026-27 season, but in how they did so with a total team buy-in to a committed defensive structure, ferocious forecheck, and ability to jump on their opponents and play with leads.

But coach Mike Sullivan, and the Blueshirts Faithful, are sure to have nightmares when they close their eyes to go to sleep after this debacle. The fact that it resembled so many disconnected meltdowns from the previous two disappointing seasons is what’s most frightening about this loss.

The Rangers (6-3-0) looked like the better team over the first 19 minutes of a scoreless first period. They didn’t allow a shot on goal until nearly 10 minutes ticked off the game clock. And shortly after that, they not only killed off a full two-minute 5-on-3 Devils power play, but the Rangers didn’t allow a single shot on goal on the successful kill.

Late in the period, the Rangers had one of their best shifts in the offensive zone, but came up empty. When the puck went back into their own end with under a minute to go, J.T. Miller inexplicably sent an errant pass to no one in the middle of the ice. Evan Rodrigues picked it off and then beat Dylan Garand at 19:30 to put the Rangers in a 1-0 hole.

That was the clear turning point of the game. It didn’t need to be since it was only 1-0 and the Rangers had the intermission to regroup and move past their captain’s mistake. But it was the turning point because the Rangers completely folded to start the second period, eerily reminiscent of last season and the one before, when one mistake all too often led to a slew of miscues.

The Rangers came unglued, looking more like the squads that failed to qualify for the Stanley Cup Playoffs the past two seasons — finishing 30th overall in 2025-26 — than the one that was so poised and confident the first eight games this season.

Garand let a long Luke Hughes shot bounce between his pads just 18 seconds into the second period. Uh oh. This started to feel an awful like an ugly flashback brewing. That was confirmed when Nico Hischier jammed home a loose puck at 4:08 and Arseny Gritsyuk buried a rebound at 4:39 — only after Garand stopped his initial breakaway seconds before.

Sullivan’s timeout after the third Devils goal clearly didn’t have the desired effect, and after Gritsyuk’s goal, he pulled Garand, who’d been so good coming into his first Rangers-Devils rivalry game.

Let’s just say the Rangers didn’t exactly clean things up for Spencer Martin. In fact, the odd-man rushes and defensive breakdowns just kept coming. The Devils added one more goal in the second period and two to close it out in the third against Martin, the journeyman netminder who battled as best he could.

This really looked and felt like it was straight out of the Rangers playbook of 2024-25 and 2025-26. It was ugly as hell, and worrisome, for sure.

“You’d like to believe that we’ve built an identity here and for an extended period of time, it wasn’t a one-off. I think what we’ve built is sustainable,” Sullivan said postgame. “We got away from it tonight, we didn’t have our best for whatever reason.”

It’s a long season. What’s most important now is how the Rangers react to this one. They can’t let it snowball. They can’t be so fragile as to let one really bad night submarine what was an inspiring start to the season.

As such, they’ve earned at least a smidge of trust. Though that disappears quickly if the dark comedy of errors continues to be pervasive in their collective game moving forward.

Key takeaways from Rangers’ 7-1 loss to Devils

Garand’s early exit

It was bound to happen at some point, but Garand crashed back down to earth and allowed more than two goals in a game for the first time in his brief NHL career. Over seven games, including six starts, with the Rangers between late last season and the start of this one, Garand allowed two goals three times, one goal three times, and zero goals once — a shutout over the Detroit Red Wings in his first start of 2026-27.

The 24-year-old allowed his third goal Thursday just 4:08 into the second period. When he surrendered yet another 31 seconds later, Garand was pulled from an NHL game for the first time. And he wasn’t too happy about what transpired, skating quickly off the ice to heasd straight down the tunnel to cool off.

When Garand did return to the bench, he stared intently ahead, clearly pissed off.

Garand entered the night with a ridiculous 1.15 goals-against average and .951 save percentage in his first four games this season. He gave up four goals on 13 shots over 24:39 against the Devils. Now let’s see how he processes this after so much success, when he, more than likely, starts against the Blue Jackets in Columbus on Saturday.

Dorofeyev’s silver lining

If there was anything positive to take out of this one, it was this: Pavel Dorofeyev snapped a six-game goal drought and also scored his first power-play goal of the season. Moved to the bumper position on the power play from the right flank, Dorofeyev neatly deflected Adam Fox’s shot past Devils goalie Nico Daws at 8:02 of the third period.

It made no difference in the game — the Rangers trailed 6-1 at that point — but likely lifted some weight off Dorofeyev’s shoulders. Imported from the Vegas Golden Knights in a draft-day trade in June to provide a major boost to the Rangers offense, the 25-year-old forward scored his first goal with his new team in their second game on Oct. 1, and then didn’t connect again until Thursday. That’s not what’s expected from him after he scored 72 goals the past two seasons combined and finished second in the NHL with 20 power-play goals last season.

Sullivan bounced him off PP1 in each of the previous two games, and passed him over a couple times at even strength in the 4-1 win over the Tampa Bay Lightning on Tuesday. So, yeah, he needed a goal, any goal, and he got it against the Devils. And it should be noted that he led the Rangers with five shots on goal and eight attempts Thursday.

Maybe the floodgates will open now.

Myriad of minuses

It should come as no surprise in a 7-1 loss, but there were a host of minus players at the end of the night for the Rangers. In fact, only two of their 18 skaters — Noah Laba and Eeli Tolvanen — did not finish with a minus rating, nor were on ice for any of New Jersey’s goals.

Miller, Fox, and Alexis Lafreniere each was minus-4. The latter two did pick up assists on Dorofeyev’s power-play goal, and Lafreniere extended his point streak to six consecutive games. Miller, on the other hand, had a nightmare night. The Rangers captain failed to record a shot on goal and had three turnovers, including the game-changing one late in the first period.

Mika Zibanejad, Vladislav Gavrikov, Tye Kartye, and Dorofeyev all were minus-3. Zibanejad failed to record a shot on goal in over 20 minutes time on ice.

On the flip side, every Devils skater except defenseman Jonathan Kovacevic was a plus player, and Kovacevic finished Even. Twelve Devils recorded at least one point, and seven finished with two points, including Luke Hughes who had the first two-goal game of his career.

One more side note: The Rangers now lost their past four visits to The Rock, outscored 22-4 in those games.

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