Devils Fail To Match Canes’ Pace In Game 1 Thrashing

James Guillory-Imagn Images

With the No. 29 overall pick in the first round of the 2021 NHL Entry Draft, Devils General Manager Tom Fitzgerald selected forward Chase Stillman. One of the available options at the slot was wing Logan Stankoven, who happened to score twice during Carolina’s 4-1 thrashing of visiting New Jersey on Sunday afternoon in Game 1 of the best-of-seven Eastern Conference Quarterfinals series.

I bring this up not because Fitzgerald happened to whiff on a pick that was universally panned at the time—I’d argue his misses on Alexander Holtz and, to this point, Simon Nemec with high lottery picks have been more harmful—or that Stankoven is the second coming of Alex Ovechkin, as he has netted all of 20 goals in 102 regular season games. And also understand that 17 other picks went by before Dallas tabbed Stankoven and then considered him an afterthought in the Mikko Rantanen trade with Carolina at the March deadline.

However, the entire process screams how Fitzgerald has hamstrung what was once a young and vibrant squad that seemed to be on the verge of prolonged success. Fitzgerald showed his affinity for a mucker like Stillman, who scored 17 goals over 100 games for AHL Utica before being sent at the deadline to Pittsburgh as part of the Cody Glass trade, even if it meant sacrificing skill. And then after the Devils bowed to the Hurricanes in five games during the 2023 Conference semis, a series where both Jack Hughes and Dougie Hamilton played through injuries, Fitzgerald became even more obsessed in leaning into the intangible “hard to play against” ethos.

The result, even if Hughes wasn’t out again with a season-ending shoulder injury, is a club that looks awfully incapable of playing at the pace necessary to compete with the NHL’s elite. When one of your better players in Game 1 was 34-year old grunt Justin Dowling, who registered all of two goals and five assists during 52 regular season contests, you knew it was going to be a rough haul.

Carolina blitzed New Jersey goalie Jacob Markstrom early and often, taking a 1-0 lead off a faceoff win to the point where Jalen Chatfield found the net with a screened snap shot just 2:24 into the contest. It wasn’t just the ridiculous 45-24 shot disparity that encapsulated the afternoon—Carolina does that to everyone, leading the league in Corsi, scoring chances percentage, and expected goals for percentage at five-on-five during the regular season, per NaturalStatTrick.com. The Canes, though, are typically a quantity-over-quality operation. During Sunday’s opening 40 minutes, NST had the high danger scoring chances as 16-4 in Carolina’s favor.

I’d be hard-pressed to remember a single one of New Jersey’s. NST labelled Nico Hischier’s goal off a rush from the left circle near the end of the second period that gave the Devils some false hope at 3-1 as a low-danger opportunity.

That rare instance of open ice occurred with the teams playing four-on-four; goading Carolina into taking matching penalties isn’t a sustainable offensive game plan. It takes fast-acting cohesion to break through the Canes’ relentless forecheck and then to eventually get shots through to goalie Frederik Andersen. Taking a beat after a touch is only going to get you dispossessed. It happened to usually reliable Hischier in the second period when he mishandled a puck behind the Devils’ net and Jordan Martinook fed Stankoven in the slot for a 2-0 Canes lead.

Unfortunately, quick transitions are just not the Devils’ game anymore, especially without Hughes in the lineup. Nor, by the way, are the Devils one of those “heavy” teams that can roll over opponents with forechecking and getting shots through from the points. At least not consistently, which is why they were averaging under three goals per game before Hughes hit the end boards in Vegas on March 2.

Devils Head Coach Sheldon Keefe has a lot of adjustments to mull over for Game 2, some of which will depend on the medical status of Glass and defensemen Brenden Dillon and Luke Hughes, all of whom went into the locker room to deal with injuries (Hughes at least returned for the latter part of the third period, in time to get stripped of the puck just inside the offensive zone that led to Andrei Svechnikov’s easy empty netter with 2:28 remaining). Keefe broke up the Hischier/Jesper Bratt combo at the start of the third period to even out the skill among his lines, but it’s hard to take anything from New Jersey’s “better” performance during those 20 minutes as Carolina dialed back its forechecking pressure in favor of having an extra man back.

Keefe had to be out of his mind during his postgame press conference when he talked about “liking” his team’s game in the first period. You know, other than giving up a goal on the first shot, momentum-swinging special teams minutes, and needing Markstrom to stand on his head to keep it at 1-0. I’m sure the dinner on the Titanic was very good too.

And to use inexperience as an excuse, who is he kidding? The only Devils’ players making their playoff debuts were bottom six wing Paul Cotter, who was a healthy scratch during the 2023 Vegas Stanley Cup run, and defenseman Johnathan Kovacevic.

In any event. with only one day off before Tuesday’s Game 2 in Carolina, it’s not like Keefe can suddenly improve the processing time of his players to better deal with the pressure on the Carolina ice. This is who the Devils have been for most of the regular season’s second half. Though this was just one game, the entire Devils organization is finding out the hard way that being slower makes you inherently easier to play against.