Swede way to start off season

GOTHENBURG, SWEDEN— Kyle Palmieri, Travis Zajac and the New Jersey Devils left the Edmonton Oilers behind in their season opener, showing the form that help them return to the playoffs last season.

Palmieri and Zajac scored two goals each to lead the Devils to a 5-2 victory Saturday night in the NHL Global Series game at Scandinavium.

“We feel like we have a good group, we have a strong culture,” New Jersey coach John Hynes said. “We like we have an identity of how we want to play, the types of players we want, how we want to be off the ice. Those are really the things that matter. We want be a tough team to play against.”

Stefan Noesen also scored, Miles Wood had two assists, and Keith Kinkaid made 17 saves.

“We played a pretty good hockey game from the start,” Zajac said. “Not too many lapses, in our play throughout the game, our speed eventually kind of took over. We played the right way, especially with the lead. It’s early in the season and it’s a good sign.”

Milan Lucic and Leon Draisaitl scored for the Oilers.

“Give them credit, they pressured us in areas that give us a lot of headache and we weren’t able to do the same for them,” Edmonton coach Todd McLellan said. “We had a tough night, it was evident,” he said. “Our puck move, our puck support, our ability to play fast and clean was not very good.”

It was the 23rd NHL regularseason game played in Europe, the 11th in Sweden and the first in Gothenburg. Prior to Saturday, the Devils completed a training camp in Switzerland where they played SC Bern in an exhibition game while the Oilers came from practice in Germany where they faced Cologne in an exhibition.

The NHL will return to Europe next month. On Nov. 1-2, the Florida Panthers and the Winnipeg Jets will play each other in a pair of regular-season games in Helsinki. Both Jets left wing Patrik Laine, a 44-goal scorer last season, and Panthers captain Aleksander Barkov are from Finland.

It was only the second time in NHL history that the last two Hart Trophy winners faced each other in a season opener. It was also only third time that the reigning Art Ross Trophy winner (McDavid) and reigning Hart Trophy winner (Taylor Hall) played against each other in a season opener.