Rookie Defenseman Injured, Devils Shut Out Penguins, 3-0

The Pittsburgh Penguins played one of their best first periods of the season on Saturday against the New Jersey Devils.

Unfortunately, they did everything but put the puck in the net.

The Devils went on to defeat the Penguins, 3-0, in a game that was tightly contested until midway through the second period. From there, the Devils took over with their speed, forecheck, and aggressive defensive attack.

Stefan Noesen scored his 15th of the season with less than three minutes remaining off of a nice feed from Nico Hischier and as a result of a defensive breakdown by Ryan Shea and Rickard Rakell in front of Tristan Jarry.

Hischier added a tally of his own in the first half of the third period – at which point, the Devils had pretty much completely taken over the game – and Timo Meier potted the empty-netter within the final two minutes to seal the loss for the Penguins.

In their last 10 games against the Devils, the Penguins are 2-8 and have been outscored, 40-21. But it’s not like they played poorly for most of the game, especially against one of the top-three teams in the league.

“Seven out of their last eight games, they’ve given up less than 20 shots,” Penguins head coach Mike Sullivan said. “So, now, it’s eight out of their last nine games that they’ve given up less than 20 shots. They defend hard, they’re fast, they had the puck… For two and a half periods, I thought we competed hard and we were right there.”

Sullivan also credited Devils goaltender Jacob Markstrom, who stopped the mere 12 Penguins’ shots he faced, but made two key stops in the second period to keep Pittsburgh from opening the scoring – one of them being a ridiculous stop on Sidney Crosby.

Here are a few other notes and observations from Saturday’s loss to the Devils:

– Rookie defenseman Owen Pickering – who has…