The Ottawa Senators improved to 9-1 against the New Jersey Devils in the brand new Prudential Center last night. Brian Gionta scored the first and only goal of the night for the Devils in the second period. The goal was made on a deflection. The Senators were solid all around on Saturday night, receiving help from Andrej Meszaros, Mike Fisher, Shean Donovan, and Daniel Alfredsson, all of whom scored goals. Goalie Martin Gerber was rock solid, blocking 31 of 32 attempted shots. Devils goalie Martin Brodeur didn’t have such a good night, blocking 23 of 26 attempted shots. This has not been Brodeur’s best season, allowing 26 goals at this point.

“We need to start figuring out ways to win games,” said Brian Gionta, who scored the lone Devils goal. “There’s no excuses: road trip, new arena; we’ve just got to win. We’re not playing 60 minutes. That’s the theme of the first 10 games.”

This game appeared to be more of the same for the Devils, despite the new Arena. Through 2 periods the Devils were not playing badly, but let the game unravel in the third period. Daniel Alfredsson of the Senators says that Martin Gerber’s performance helped propel Ottawa to victory.

“They had a great first period, but Gerber kept us in the game and we grew into the game in the second and third, we knew they wanted to win this one.”

With the new arena not ready at the start of the season, the Devils started out on the road, losing 6 of 9 games. Now that they can play at home, there’s really no excuse for them to be playing so badly. There’s still all the time in the world for the Devils to improve in the standings, but they had better pick it up, and fast.