New Jersey had a chance to not only clinch a playoff berth, but win four games in a row for the first time in two years. They failed to do both. There’s a reason for that.
I want to revisit and expand upon a thought I touched on a couple weeks ago when I talked about how this Devils team is exhausting.
Every time this team has had any modicum of success the last few years, they find a way to go right back to being a letdown, which is part of the reason why this team hasn’t won four in a row for almost two years now.
The New Jersey Devils were coming off of a pretty good week last week. They picked up 4 points against the Wild in what I deemed playoff-like efforts, and followed that up by beating that team across the river one last time in 2024-25. Those wins, along with Rangers losses, trimmed the Devils magic number down to 1, which is good! For the sixth time this season (and fourteenth time since January 7-16, 2023), the Devils had won three in a row and were looking to win a fourth straight game. This is also good!
They also entered last night’s game with everything to play for, needing just a single, measly, lousy, stinkin’ point to clinch a playoff berth for the second time in three seasons. One point. You don’t even have to win the game to get one point! The bar literally could not be set any lower.
Standing in their way? The Boston Bruins, who entered last night tied for last place in the Eastern Conference and essentially had nothing to play for but pride. A team that traded away their captain and several other role players at the trade deadline last month. A team that was 1-8-1 in their last ten games entering last night and had recently been eliminated from playoff contention for the first time in nearly a decade.
The Devils had everything to play for in their building. The Bruins are playing out the string.
Take a guess which team took it to the other last night.
If you guessed Boston taking it to the Devils, you’d be right.
You might have watched last night’s game and thought to yourself “Actually, I thought the Devils mostly took it to Boston, at least before the game got out of hand”. And you may point to the fancy stats to support that argument. But by now, you know me well enough to know that I care far more about REAL goals than expected goals. And once again, the Devils gave up far too many real goals because of their inability to manage the game. They gave up real goals because Jesper Bratt made a boneheaded turnover that led to a goal, Luke Hughes overskated a puck that led to breakaway and another goal, and Seamus Casey redirected a fluttering puck into his own net as it somehow got by Jacob Markstrom. They let Morgan Geekie get to the front of the net to score a goal. They failed to clear the puck off of a big rebound that led to a Fraser Minten goal to put the game out of reach. They did nothing to take away Boston’s only legitimate offensive threat in David Pastrnak, despite having home ice and the benefit of last change. And they weren’t done giving up goals either. They gave up seven in total to the team in the Eastern Conference who has scored fewer goals than anyone.
Unacceptable.
I don’t care what the “Deserve to Win O’Meter” says. We all watched the game. The Devils did not deserve to win.
They fell behind 3-0 on home ice in a “win and in” scenario against one of the worst teams in the conference. They gave up a backbreaking goal late in the second period when they managed to show a little fight and claw within one, effectively killing any chance they had of stealing a point. They got their doors blown off in the third period. And once again, that elusive four game winning streak would have to wait another day. Clinching a playoff berth would have to wait another day. The only things they managed to do, aside from embarrassing themselves, was play down to their competition. Something they’ve actually done consistently plenty of times these last few years.
I don’t want this to come across as me completely disparaging the Bruins or dismissing them. No, they’re not very good. But they were very good last night. They are a team of professional players. The NHL is the toughest league in the world. Organizations might tank but players don’t tank. Players are playing for jobs, whether it is in Boston or elsewhere next season. The tape doesn’t lie.
I also acknowledge that not every team is not going to be on top of their game every single night over the course of an 82-game season. I’m not in the room and I’m not a mindreader, so I can’t get into the players’ heads and what they’re thinking.
That said, games like last night are why this Devils team is as frustrating as they are. It’s why I wrote two weeks ago that they’re exhausting to watch. It’s why they’re tough to take seriously as a legitimate threat to do anything once they get to the playoffs. Yes, every team will lose to a bad team once in a while, but when you do it as consistently as THESE Devils do, you haven’t earned the benefit of the doubt that its a one-off or a fluke. At some point, when you do this time after time, this is who you are as a team.
The fact that this has gone on now for multiple years, under multiple coaches, with multiple goaltenders and different skaters though? That suggests that there might be a bigger problem at hand.
Let me re-write the highlighted portion what I started this article with.
Every time this team has had any modicum of success the last few years, they find a way to go right back to being a letdown, which is part of the reason why this team hasn’t won four in a row for almost two years now.
I didn’t just throw that statement out there willy nilly. I threw it out there because its true.
The Devils had success in 2022-23, setting a franchise record in points and beating their biggest rival in a playoff series. Yes, they lost to Carolina in the next round, but the foundation was in place to build upon that success. Did the Devils do that though?
No, they did not. They had one of the more frustrating seasons in franchise history, and while yes, while injuries were a major part of it, the amount of self-inflicted mistakes contributed even more so. Things got so bad that Tom Fitzgerald was quoted on breakup day last year saying that the players weren’t spending enough time in the gym, which is code for “you didn’t work hard enough over the summer, and you damn well didn’t work hard enough during this past year”.
Does that sound like a team that handled success all that well the previous year? Having what is essentially your boss call you out for not working hard enough? No, it does not.
That’s why I was particularly pleased with the start of this season, where the Devils not only entered the Christmas break 23-11-3 but were doing so off of the back of several dominant defensive efforts. I figured the Devils took that message to heart, showed up to camp with a “no nonsense” attitude, got off to a good start, and put those failures behind them. Why? Because their body of work in the early portion of this season said so.
I don’t know what happened after that where the Devils got away from that for the better part of several months, and I get you’re not going to go balls to the wall for 82 games if you want to have anything left in the tank for the playoffs, but there were far too many efforts in late December, January, February, and the early portion of March to just entirely dismiss it either.
The Devils did enough over the first few months of the season to solidly put themselves in a playoff spot, only to go into cruise control. They still haven’t been able to clinch a playoff berth through Game 78 of the campaign.
Does that sound like they’re handling success? Or does that sound like a team that is content to squeak in, thanks in part to the ineptitude of the rest of the Eastern Conference.
I already mentioned their failure to win four in a row this season. What I didn’t mention is that most of those losses going for that fourth game are against teams that nobody would exactly consider a juggernaut. Losses to teams like San Jose at home, Columbus, Pittsburgh, and now Boston at home. Sure, there are playoff teams like Carolina and St. Louis mixed in there as well. But because the Devils failed to get those points then, they have to play for those points now, at a time where they should be resting up for what’s to come.
Does that sound like a team that is managing success?
Stop me when I start telling lies.
If you’re going to consistently be a letdown against the San Joses and Anaheims and now the Bostons of the world, how am I supposed to take you seriously when the stakes are raised and you’re facing Carolina in a best of seven series?
It’s not that the Devils can’t beat good teams. They’ve shown this year they can beat good teams like Florida, Carolina, and Washington. Unfortunately, they’ve also shown they can lose to anyone on any given night.
The worst part is this falls under the intangible portion of evaluating players and teams. I mentioned how I’m not in the players’ heads and I don’t know what they’re thinking. But I do know the “this is a young team” excuse doesn’t really fly when the team has gotten older the last few years with as many veteran imports as they’ve had.
I do know that we apparently haven’t gotten to the point that somebody in that room hasn’t said “we’re not losing this (bleeping) game”, which is far different than another local team where one of their leaders said “we don’t get swept at home”. Because if we have gotten to that point, the Devils wouldn’t be losing games like last night. The Devils would’ve clinched already.
I do know if this is part of the maturing process of a hockey team, the Devils better figure it out. And fast. Once you get into a playoff series, every game is a must win. You can’t afford no-shows like what the Devils did last night. Not unless your goal is to be one-and-done because you’re just happy to be there.
The energy that you need. That level of compete. The sense of urgency. They all need to be there from puck drop through the final horn. Every game. Not once a week. Not twice a week. Not with “we won three in a row so we can afford to take a night off” regularity. Every. Game. The rest of the league is too talented. The Devils can’t just ramp it up for 5 minute intervals here and there and expect to win games, and the elite teams in the league are too talented to let you get away with that at all.
Until the Devils learn that they need to play that way consistently, games like Boston are going to continue to happen.
Seventy Eight games into the 2024-25 campaign, its who the New Jersey Devils are.