NEW YORK -- The Devils played with nine forwards while benching Marcus Johansson, Pavel Zacha and Jimmy Hayes for the final 35 minutes of Saturday's 3-2 win over the Rangers.

Devils coach John Hynes said the decision was made based on how the rest of the forwards were playing and how the team turned things around in the second period.

"Just thought tonight it was what was best for the team," Hynes said. "Where we're at, what we were doing, it was just a decision that we made that felt was going to be best for the group."

Johnasson logged only 4:48 off ice time while playing seven shifts. Zacha had 5:35 of ice time on eight shifts and Hayes had 6:56 of ice time on nine shifts.

None of them played in the third period, and after the three played a shift around the 5:00 mark of the second period, they did not appear again.

The Devils did rally for three goals after the three stopped playing, and the team shook off a shaky start where they recorded just three shots in the first period.

Whether Hynes was sending a message to the team or just rolling with the hot hands, it was a drastic move.

"I didn't really notice it until early in the third there when it was brought up," Devils captain Andy Greene said. "Hopefully it doesn't have to get to that point, but sometimes there has to be a message sent. I thought the other guys that played had a great response, and i know next time we're in that situation, it's not going to be those guys and they're going to be ready to play."

"We're not worried about the way they're playing," Greene continued. "It just happened to be in this instance in this game."

Following Friday's 5-2 loss to the Washington Capitals, where the Devils struggled to adjust to the game in front of them, they showed better poise handling adversity from the start of the second period on Saturday.

"For the final 40 minutes, very well. For the first 20 minutes, not good," Hynes said of the team's handling of adversity. "Our goaltender was the biggest difference in the game in the first period. But I do think after the first period you have to look and go into the room and talk about the push back that the guys had, the grit that we showed.

"We did have push back, and we were able to find a way after a bad start to a game to find a way to win a game against a very good team in a challenging building to play it."

Chris Ryan may be reached at cryan@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @ChrisRyan_NJ. Find NJ.com Devils on Facebook.