Bratt's Breakaway Rescues Devils After Blues Erase Three-Goal Lead in 5-4 Overtime Win

For most of Thursday night at the Prudential Center, the New Jersey Devils looked like a team cruising. Then, in the space of a few frantic minutes, they looked like a team in freefall. And then Jesper Bratt made sure none of it mattered. Bratt scored a breakaway goal 1:26 into overtime to give the Devils a 5-4 win over the St. Louis Blues, rescuing two points from a game New Jersey had led 4-1 late in the third period. The winner came moments after Dougie Hamilton broke up a scoring chance near the Devils' net, springing Bratt the other way. The Swedish winger beat Jordan Binnington cleanly for his third goal of the season, with Hamilton picking up his seventh assist. It was a finish the Devils badly needed, because the third period had turned into a nightmare. Anthony Mantha had scored twice and added an assist, Luke Hughes had a goal and an assist, and Jack Hughes and Brett Pesce each set up two goals as New Jersey built what looked like a comfortable 4-1 lead and extended its winning run at home. The Prudential Center crowd had every reason to relax. Then the Blues woke up. Mason McTavish, Philip Broberg and Dalibor Dvorsky all scored in the third period to drag St. Louis level, three goals in a little over three minutes that wiped out the Devils' advantage entirely and left the building stunned. McTavish and Broberg also had an assist apiece in the comeback, and suddenly a routine home win had become a test of nerve. That is what made Bratt's winner matter so much. New Jersey has now won three straight games and seven of its last eight, and six in a row on home ice, but this one could easily have slipped away. Instead, one breakaway — one clean finish from a player who has made a career of delivering in big moments — turned a collapse into a celebration. For the Blues, it was a familiar kind of frustration. They fell for the fourth time in six games despite producing one of the comebacks of the young season, and they left Newark with nothing to show for a third period in which they were, for a few dizzying minutes, the better team by a distance. The Devils, meanwhile, head into the weekend with their home streak intact and their belief growing — even if this one came a lot closer than it ever should have.