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This was building up all season long.
Deploying their fourth lines to start their third and final meeting of the season, with the Rangers’ face-puncher Matt Rempe on one side and the Devils’ enforcer Kurtis MacDermid on the other, a five-on-five line brawl ensued off the opening faceoff in a chaotic scene at center ice of Madison Square Garden on Wednesday (US time) before the Blueshirts won, 4-3.
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Rempe, who had been ejected in each of the previous two meetings (and then suspended for four games in the latter contest) for hits that knocked Devils players out for extended periods of time, took on MacDermid.
K’Andre Miller squared off with John Marino.
Jimmy Vesey fought Curtis Lazar.
Barclay Goodrow dropped the gloves with Kevin Bahl.
Captain Jacob Trouba went at it with Chris Tierney.
Since Vesey and Lazar were the first to drop the gloves, everybody else got hit with game misconducts for secondary fighting.
The Rangers lost Miller, Trouba, Rempe and Goodrow, while the Devils lost MacDermid, Marino, Bahl and Tierney.
Rangers head coach Peter Laviolette and Devils interim coach Travis Green then started jawing at one another from their respective benches.
“Our guys were reacting to what was happening on the ice,” said Laviolette, who said he did not know the line brawl was going to happen. “I thought they did a fantastic job. All five of them.”
In three games against the Devils this season, Rempe finished with 47 penalty minutes, two fights and three game misconducts in 5:03 of ice time.
This article was originally published at the New York Post and was republished with permission.
