Devils 4, Hurricanes 2
Ilya Kovalchuk snapped a tie just over six minutes into the third period and captain Zach Parise scored twice as the New Jersey Devils skated to their first win of the season with a 4-2 home triumph over the Carolina Hurricanes on Monday afternoon.
Johan Hedberg turned aside 24 shots and defenseman Mark Fayne also scored for New Jersey, which rebounded from Saturday's 3-0 season-opening loss to the rival Philadelphia Flyers.
With the game tied at 2-2, Kovalchuk accepted a backhanded centering feed from Jacob Josefson and wristed a shot that Cam Ward denied with his left pad. The Russian collected his own rebound and lifted the puck past the prone netminder for his first goal of the season just 6:06 into the third period.
Parise added an empty-net goal for his 12th career tally versus Carolina.
Nick Palmieri and Kovalchuk collected a pair of assists for the Devils, who handed coach Peter DeBoer his first victory as the team's coach.
Chad LaRose and Alexei Ponikarovsky scored second-period goals for Carolina, which remained winless on the young season after recording just one point in a pair of losses to Southeast Division rivals Tampa Bay and Washington.