Devils are doing exactly what I expected... Play smart and play a full 60 minutes and they win. Take stupid penalties and they fall victim to Florida's powerplay, which is the biggest weapon they have. I was stressed out for that entire game last night and I'll be a wreck tomorrow night, too. If they get past Florida, then I'll feel a hell of a lot better for the second round.
On another note, the officiating this season has been a fucking catastrophe. I don't know where these refs are crawling out from under, but they keep blowing games with missed calls on obvious penalties, penalizing players for phantom penalties, etc. This has been league-wide and it's continuing into the playoffs in a huge way. last night alone there were at least two huge non-calls that impacted the game. Kovalchuk got blatantly tripped and effectively taken out of the play and Florida was able to capitalize on that and score on the ensuing rush since NJ was then back-peddling a man short. Then in OT, Salvadore clearly tripped a Panthers forward and it wasn't called where it was so obvious I couldn't believe they didn't call it. That would have given Florida their potent powerplay and who knows what could have happened. I'm a Devils fan, but fair is fair.
Ok, /rant.