GDT: Your New Jersey Devils (5-2-0, 10 Pts) vs. Washington Capitals (2-1-0, 4 Pts), 7 PM, MSGSN2

[Bcap88]

Peace and Luke were in regular practice jerseys and practicing

2 players have to go down once they get activated

My guess is probably Nemec and Casey tbh

 

[Bcap88]

I feel like there’s this weird revisionist history going on with Jack because he’s not been himself for such a long time now. People are acting like he needs to overhaul his game and become this responsible guy that plays within the confines of the system and adjusts his game to be his best. I don’t want that guy. I want the 21-22 and 22-23 Jack that was out there doing his thing and pummeling the competition. He wasn’t some freewheeler that just only cared about offense. He was engaged defensively and posted strong defensive results. Sure the guy wasn’t Bergeron out there but that’s not what you want from Jack Hughes.

I think it’s an adjustment period tbh

Keefe is obviously instilling structure into this team and if you look at the team as a whole the north/south players(hischier,timo,cotter,noesen) are a step ahead of the east and west players right now(bratt,Hughes)

 

[Captain3rdLine]

Peace and Luke were in regular practice jerseys and practicing

2 players have to go down once they get activated

My guess is probably Nemec and Casey tbh

First that means nothing at a morning skate. Morning skates are contactless so everybody wears normal jerseys.

And nobody actually has to go down. The devils have 21 people without those 2 because they’re only carrying one extra forward. But unless they plan on carrying 9 D with two of them being 20 and possibly out of the lineup I’d imagine at least one of them is sent down (Casey). Don’t think Luke’s all that close to being though. I would expect Pesce very soon with Casey likely coming out.

 

[MadDevil]

Peace and Luke were in regular practice jerseys and practicing

2 players have to go down once they get activated

My guess is probably Nemec and Casey tbh

I don't know who else you'd take out, especially with Kovacevic, who was likely looked at as being the #7 guy coming in earning a regular spot with his play so far.

 

[Jersey Fan 12]

That's what I felt happened to Luke last season, but Ruff and co. just ground Luke into a pulp by November. Took him another two months to turn it around.

How was Luke's lack of defensive play Lindy Ruff's fault? That wasn't something that just happened at the end of the year. He clearly wasn't NHL ready but the decision to play him prominent minutes did not come from the coaching staff.

 

[Captain3rdLine]

I don't know who else you'd take out, especially with Kovacevic, who was likely looked at as being the #7 guy coming in earning a regular spot with his play so far.

Still think it’ll be a while before Luke’s back. So we’ll see where things are at once he is but Nemec’s been starting to play better and better and Kovacevic’s great play may not sustain as others have mentioned as well. We will see.

My guess is that unless Kovacevic is still playing this great hockey in a bit when Luke’s back and Nemec isn’t, Kovacevic may still end up the odd man out.

 

[Bramskii]

Just an observation but Markstrom this season seems to have really poor positioning. Granted, a lot of the goals against have been deflected, but he always seems way out of his crease to be able to make saves. Not saying he was the problem tonight but it's just an area of concern.

 

[Brooklyndevil]

Give the Devils credit for tying the game, although they were sloppy. In OT, I thought Jack had open corner but shot into the goaltender’s bred-basket and I thought Meier ended the game. The Caps goaltender either made a great save or got lucky. I also thought Markstrom should have stopped Wilson’s goal. The Devils really need to take advantage of home ice, which they so far haven’t and that’s a bad sign.

 

[Call Me Al]

happy with the record but they don’t look like a good team yet. it’s an improvement that we’ve beaten shitty teams and i like us scoring first finally, but they’ve been thoroughly dominated in 3 out of 8 games so far.

jack is basically MIA, hopefully he puts it together soon but he gets hemmed in the d zone way too much maybe he’s not a true center? i think a big blind spot for fitz was not filling the center depth because we could really use that hughes-haula combo for face-offs and defensive covering.

i expect a lot of this to come together with a new coach and system, but it’s too early for me to tell if it’s a good team. winning the games were “supposed to win” is an improvement but they look completely outclassed by better or more hardworking teams. last night was uncompetitive and they’re lucky to get a point.

also markstrom looks fine but he does get out of position too much. is this our shit goalie coach rubbing off?

 

[bigd]

Still think it’ll be a while before Luke’s back. So we’ll see where things are at once he is but Nemec’s been starting to play better and better and Kovacevic’s great play may not sustain as others have mentioned as well. We will see.

My guess is that unless Kovacevic is still playing this great hockey in a bit when Luke’s back and Nemec isn’t, Kovacevic may still end up the odd man out.

I doubt Kovacevic will be the odd man out. Casey will go to Utica and Nemec will be the odd man out until he can show he deserves a spot.

 

[MartyOwns]

send one of our 2 rookie defensemen down, put luke on the 4th line, send palat to the titanic wreck in a submersible. problems solved.

 

[bigd]

We didn’t deserve a point out of that shitfest, still got one.

I’ll take it.

I turned it off after the second period, couldn't watch that anymore. I was pleasantly surprised to see that they scratched out a point with the way they were playing.

 

[NJDevs26]

Give the Devils credit for tying the game, although they were sloppy. In OT, I thought Jack had open corner but shot into the goaltender’s bred-basket and I thought Meier ended the game. The Caps goaltender either made a great save or got lucky. I also thought Markstrom should have stopped Wilson’s goal. The Devils really need to take advantage of home ice, which they so far haven’t and that’s a bad sign.

When have they ever done so at the Rock? Even 2022-23 they were record setting on the road and just okay at home.

 

[SansaStark]

happy with the record but they don’t look like a good team yet. it’s an improvement that we’ve beaten shitty teams and i like us scoring first finally, but they’ve been thoroughly dominated in 3 out of 8 games so far.

jack is basically MIA, hopefully he puts it together soon but he gets hemmed in the d zone way too much maybe he’s not a true center? i think a big blind spot for fitz was not filling the center depth because we could really use that hughes-haula combo for face-offs and defensive covering.

i expect a lot of this to come together with a new coach and system, but it’s too early for me to tell if it’s a good team. winning the games were “supposed to win” is an improvement but they look completely outclassed by better or more hardworking teams. last night was uncompetitive and they’re lucky to get a point.

also markstrom looks fine but he does get out of position too much. is this our shit goalie coach rubbing off?

They’re not a good team. We’re improved from last year but that bar is low.
If we were a good team we would not looked like utter crap as often as we have so far. Toronto, Carolina, Ottawa….not good efforts.
Nico getting going is a good sign.
Jack has been so terrible you are right to question the entire trajectory of this franchise if he doesn’t start to show signs of life soon.

We will have to see how the defense improves with Brett&Luke. But most likely this is a fringe playoff team on the bubble. They may not even make it. Instead of an 81 point team, they’re a 95 point team.

They need to be way way better.

 

[Jason MacIsaac]

New coach, new system and injuries will make any team get off to a slow start. NJ being +3 is a great start considering. I’d wait for the 20 game mark before starting to panic and think trade.

 

[JK3]

Man you guys are going on and on about Jack and other forwards for pages. They scored five goals, you should win every game potting five.

Saw some of the game here and there, giving up six is brutal. Sounds like a Lindy special, what the hell happened back there?

 

[Devs3cups]

happy with the record but they don’t look like a good team yet. it’s an improvement that we’ve beaten shitty teams and i like us scoring first finally, but they’ve been thoroughly dominated in 3 out of 8 games so far.

jack is basically MIA, hopefully he puts it together soon but he gets hemmed in the d zone way too much maybe he’s not a true center? i think a big blind spot for fitz was not filling the center depth because we could really use that hughes-haula combo for face-offs and defensive covering.

i expect a lot of this to come together with a new coach and system, but it’s too early for me to tell if it’s a good team. winning the games were “supposed to win” is an improvement but they look completely outclassed by better or more hardworking teams. last night was uncompetitive and they’re lucky to get a point.

also markstrom looks fine but he does get out of position too much. is this our shit goalie coach rubbing off?

In my eyes, they’ve looked like a very good team at times, and a bad team at times. There’s an adjustment period to be expected with the new coach/system, the hectic schedule and the injuries to key players.

There are positive signs, but they haven’t found their A game consistently yet. They look a bit disorganized and unsure at times, but I’ve also noticed some positives defensively. Hopefully, once they get more acclimated to the system, get into a more normal schedule and the 2 injured top-4 D-men return, they’ll find their game consistently.

 

[Billdo]

and what if they never do?

Nobody is just going to sit in their own end for 5 minutes and if they do blow it dead and have a defensive zone faceoff.

View attachment 918890

Palat has to go.

He's been bad on levels I didn't even think were possible. We cannot have him here next year.

 

[devilsblood]

I wonder if part of the issue with Jack 5v5 is that Keefe is handing his line a ton of offensive zone starts which to me is the opposite of what you want - Jack isn't that great at creating offense from there, where he excels is creating offense off the rush. Jack's been committed to defense and not flying the zone, etc. and so this is limiting some of his rush offense also.

Keefe was trying out the Hughes line with Casey-Nemec as a 5 man unit but that went away pretty quick.

He kind of has a lot of offensive zone starts, four less then Nico who is the team leader, but what he is really getting a lot of is on the fly starts.

Hughes get's infinitely more o-zone starts then d-zone starts(of which he has zero so far) but Keefe just does not start Hughes's shifts much on faceoffs in general.

 

[Mgd31]

The lack of an LD really is messing up the defense. Can’t wait till Luke comes back. Also I don’t know what you do Palat. I guess see if Nico can save him which he should be able to but Mercer and Timo have been so good with him and I really don’t want to break up that line.

 

[Satans Hockey]

When have they ever done so at the Rock? Even 2022-23 they were record setting on the road and just okay at home.

They were 24-13-4 at home that season but the best home records were when the building first opened. 17-18 was solid too though.

08-09 was the best with them going 28-12-1

NHL Records

records.nhl.com

 

[Bleedred]

Still eternally grateful for the point.

What a disaster those first 2 periods were. I can’t believe we tied it again and came back from 2 down after going down 2 goals the first time we tied it down 2.

 

[Bleedred]

They were 24-13-4 at home that season but the best home records were when the building first opened. 17-18 was solid too though.

08-09 was the best with them going 28-12-1

NHL Records

records.nhl.com

That 7-18-3 from 20-21 was insanely bad. With a 500 road record.

Fortunately, that was the Covid shortened season, so most of the games had no attendance at all, then later in the season very reduced attendance. I’m glad not many people paid to see that.

I always remember how the home record was horrifyingly bad and lopsided that year, but never remember the exact numbers.

That was more regulation losses in a 28 home game schedule than a lot of the recent seasons with a 41 home game schedule.

 

[devilsblood]

The lack of an LD really is messing up the defense. Can’t wait till Luke comes back. Also I don’t know what you do Palat. I guess see if Nico can save him which he should be able to but Mercer and Timo have been so good with him and I really don’t want to break up that line.

The Luke injury is a pretty big issue. Not only do we have a righty playing on their off hand, (sometimes that righty being a rookie, a guy the coach doesn't want to play a whole lot), we are also playing Dillon way more minutes then he should be playing.

At 5-2-1 we have done a good job getting through this stretch thus far.

Kova's play has made the Pesce injury a non issue.

 

[guitarguyvic]

Some of you guys are nuts. They’ve been up and down a bit these first eight games, but last year there was no “up”. Every game they looked like dumb f***s out there giving up a shitfest of like 5-6 odd man rushes, and they were only getting wins early be sheer fortune. This year they’ve basically lost every game where they haven’t looked good. This is an improvement. Now when you put in the context of a new coach, lots of new players, a couple of injuries, wonky schedule…there’s plenty there to be optimistic about.

I’m not concerned about the team as a whole. I’m more concerned with specific individuals/issues. Jack still playing like a f***ing 18 year old. Our top players still seeming way too soft on the puck against tougher teams and not having solid chemistry with each other. Palat being a huge net negative. Stuff like that.