Slotting Meier In Devils’ Lineup Is A No-Brainer For Ruff

Devils Coach Continues To Make All The Right Moves

With newly acquired teammate Timo Meier sitting up in the Colorado press box, the Devils put on an offensive clinic against the defending Stanley Cup champion Avalanche on Wednesday night before holding on for a 7-5 victory.

The 31-goal scoring wing, still nursing an upper body injury from while he was with San Jose, is expected to return to action in short order. Until then, there has been some speculation as to where he’ll fit in within New Jersey’s top six.

Unless Devils Head Coach Lindy Ruff suffers a brain lock, there shouldn’t be much of a discussion. With the top line centered by Nico Hischier flanked by wings Dawson Mercer and Tomas Tatar imposing their will on opponents every night, they can’t be broken up.

Each member registered a goal on Wednesday and the line accumulated six assists, three of them from the stick of the red-hot Mercer, who has now tallied goals in seven consecutive games, a Devils record. The unit is optimally synched, with each player understanding where they need to be to provide support to transition the play up the ice. Add in their dogged work ethic in all zones and their exceptional skill in tight spaces, and it’s no wonder that the line has outscored their opponents, 7-1, at five-on-five over the last seven games.

Meier may be Hischier’s Swiss compatriot, with experience playing together in international tournaments, but this isn’t youth hockey, where you try to team up friends on the ice.

No, the obvious fit here, for which I expect Ruff to concur, is for Meier to replace the underperforming Yegor Sharangovich on Jack Hughes’ left wing. Along with the elusive Jesper Bratt on his off wing, that’s one scary trio.

As for anyone’s concern, including those on the MSG broadcast, that there’s only one puck to be handled by high-volume shooters Hughes and Meier, this isn’t basketball, where isolation plays are the norm. They happen, especially with the brilliant Hughes, but it’s rare for an individual to skate the length of the ice to score on his own. Even the prettiest goals are of the tic-tac-toe variety with strings of connected passes while many others are more flukish, coming off deflections/ricochets or scrums at the net front.

Meier can score off any of those scenarios. At 6-foot 1 and 220 pounds, he is a beast around the net and his quick hands enable him to beat goalies from the circles. Oh, and just like Hughes, he is a more than a capable playmaker, recording 41 assists last season.

Meier should have the chance to play with Hischier on the Devils’ top power play unit, with Ondrej Palat moving down to PP2. Whether Meier is at the net front or in the bumper spot—or interchanges with Hischier—it doesn’t matter. Pucks find him and he knows how to cash in on those opportunities.

Sharangovich, unfortunately, just hasn’t embraced his own golden opportunity to play in New Jersey’s.top six. Always a streaky scorer during his three NHL seasons, he just hasn’t unleashed the hot hand that helped him notch 24 goals last season. In his last 16 games, he has managed to record just 2 goals and 4 assists. Sharangovich was also minus-3 on Wednesday, which probably cemented his demotion in favor of Meier.      

It's a no-brainer.

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Just a quick few words on Ruff once again pushing the right buttons….

1) It may have been surprising to some when Ruff pulled goalie Vitek Vanecek after he surrendered Colorado’s fifth goal 1:26 into the third period, but it was proven to be the correct call. Rookie Akira Schmid came on to stop all 11 shots he faced to protect New Jersey’s one-goal lead until Hischier sealed it with an empty netter with 1:14 remaining. After the game, Ruff noted how Schmid had done this before, saving a game against Ottawa on November 10 when Vanecek got injured in the third period. Schmid stoned the Senators on an overtime power play before Hischier won it. Sometimes, a coach uses this tactic to motivate his skaters into playing with better defensive structure and puck management. Though the Avs’ did have some scoring chances down the stretch, it was nothing like the racetrack that was the game’s first 40-odd minutes.

2) and 3) relate to Ruff’s recent personnel changes: After a desultory 5-2 loss to lowly Montreal at home on February 21, he swapped out struggling veteran defenseman Brendan Smith for rookie Kevin Bahl, who has responded with some of the best performances of his young career. He has been much more confident with the puck on his stick and has been using his size (6-foot 6, 230 pounds) to deliver crunching hits. The Devils have won all three subsequent contests, with the team owning a gaudy 80.63 expected goals percentage at five-on-five with Bahl on the ice, per NaturalStatTtick.com.

One game later, before the Devils’ 7-0 thrashing of the Flyers, Ruff used Fabian Zetterlund’s inclusion in the Meier trade as an opportunity to reinsert Nathan Bastian into the lineup, reuniting him with linemates Michael McLeod and Miles Wood. The BMW line has been flying around the ice in the last two games—when your fourth line is contributing multiple goals, that takes a ton of pressure off the core players. Bastian put home a goal in each contest and was also credited in my personal “screen assist” column on Dougie Hamilton’s second period snipe that put New Jersey up over the Avs, 4-1. Despite his lowly status, Bastian will play an important role in the playoffs, when simple things like blocking shots and clearing pucks out of the defensive zone matter more.

As I wrote earlier in the season, it’s incredible how quickly Ruff has moved from the hot seat to a Jack Adams candidate for Coach of the Year. The Devils (40-15-5) own the third-best record in the entire NHL after five consecutive playoff-less seasons. Give credit where it’s due.