GDT: Devils @ Canucks - 10:00 PM - MSG

[jkrdevil]

Watching the replay on NHL Network with the Canucks broadcast. Good lord they are homers.

 

[Eggtimer]

I don't think that's true either. If Blackwood starts Thursday and has a bad game, Vitek will get a run. I also think if Blackwood starts Thursday and is good, Vanecek will start on Saturday. There is no A or B.

I think they planned on having VV start the more difficult game vs Oilers and wanted him well rested so they gave MB the Canucks game . The Saturday game against the Flames ? If VV plays well I see him starting that one too . If he falters , it’s MB. Just my guess

 

[devilsblood]

Rewatching it again. It was actually the better pass. Bratts was also great, but he had a clean lane to Nico for the slam dunk which allowed him to keep it on the ice. Jack had the much more difficult pass to make which allowed Bratt and Nico to do the slam dunk.

Hughes had more time while Bratt had to catch a hot pass and get the pass off quickly, and still pin pointed it.

The sauce is nice is though.

 

[Bleedred]

I'm not so sold on Vanacek as the starter either. I really don't mind Ruff mixing and matching the goalies unless someone absolutely steals the job.

I’m not sold on him as a long term solution, but how hasn’t he stolen the job at least as of now?

may rangers fans play drums or trumpets


anybody knows where's this one from?

'the chances are 50-50, maybe even 60-60.'

I’m confused by the Rangers fans comment. Are you getting him confused with RangerDoggo?

 

[njdevils1982]

Ha, that's hilarious, I was mesmerized by the dancers that I didn't notice.

My kudo's to the guy behind the mixer.

i think it was common practice for top of the pops

 

[severian]

I’m not sold on him as a long term solution, but how hasn’t he stolen the job at least as of now?


I’m confused by the Rangers fans comment. Are you getting him confused with RangerDoggo?

Because Blackwood also had a 3 game winning streak. I don't think laying an egg to a Capitals team that always seems to beat us makes Vanacek the undisputed starter. Vanacek played well. Blackwood just played a solid game. I like the idea of them both playing terrified that the other guy is going to steal the net.

 

[Bleedred]

Because Blackwood also had a 3 game winning streak. I don't think laying an egg to a Capitals team that always seems to beat us makes Vanacek the undisputed starter. Vanacek played well. Blackwood just played a solid game. I like the idea of them both playing terrified that the other guy is going to steal the net.

I just have no faith in Blackwood. I don’t think he’s a good goalie.

Some people wanna make me feel a fool for doubting an .892% goalie over the last 61 games (hey! It went up a point! It was .891% before last night!) will be good again.

Or like I’m slandering a player that’s actually good like Jack Hughes or Nico.

Way better players have been shit talked on this board.

Vanecek has been the better goalie this regular season, preseason and last two seasons. Some people put way too much confidence into a goalie that hasn’t had more than a handful of good games in a row in close to 3 years.

 

[My3Sons]

Rewatching it again. It was actually the better pass. Bratts was also great, but he had a clean lane to Nico for the slam dunk which allowed him to keep it on the ice. Jack had the much more difficult pass to make which allowed Bratt and Nico to do the slam dunk. Saucing it through that much traffic, that quickly to the tape of Bratt allowed the clear lane to Nico.

View attachment 602229View attachment 602230

During the broadcast, Sal talked about the play and apparently it was Hischier properly timing his drive to the net that distracted the defenders to open up Jack's lane to Bratt while Jack's pass to Bratt froze the defense enough to create the lane to Nico. Really one of those plays that you draw up on the board and don't expect to see too often in real life. Great work all around and really shows off the skill and nuance of all three players.

 

[glenwo2]

Missed this game too. I was intending to stay up for at least the first two periods, but had a tough day and got tired early.

I'm pleased to see the score, and more domination in shots after a slow start in the first period. Pretty cool that our top guys are scoring, with Bratt's streak continuing and Hughes still getting his points, while Nico is beasting at both ends. But it looks like the secondary scoring came through last night too, and you need that on nights when not everything is clicking.

Very exciting team this year, and an incredible turnaround from a rocky start.

Indeed.

Very exciting thus far.

And I look forward to Bratt hopefully breaking the Devils record this Thursday, too.

Let's go.

 

[Eggtimer]

Fir now I personally have more faith in VV than MB . Blackwood would have to have a string of 4/5/6 quality starts to make me feel comfortable with his play . So far he has been inconsistent to me . Yes he’s had “ good “ starts but nothing amazing .

The internal competition is good to have . Keep them pushing eachother to try to win the net .

Overall , I still don’t feel like we can win anything significant with either of these two . Hopefully I’m wrong

 

[HBK27]

I’m not sold on him as a long term solution, but how hasn’t he stolen the job at least as of now?

It's way too early for either of them to really steal the job.

Vanecek certainly has the advantage as he has the better stats this season & better recent track record. That being said, he's had 3 good games and one dogshit game compared to a 4/2 split for Blackwood. No one's really running away with this yet.

I expect Vanecek to get the start tomorrow night and the staff continue to evaluate the starter on a game-by-game basis unless we start to see some real separation between the two.

 

[devilsblood]

Now the Nico goal, and the passing prior, does take us back to what role the pp coach plays into the improvement we've seen. Verses the role the maturation of the players brings.

A pin point cross ice sauce pass, a quick catch and pass tape to tape, and a one touch burial off the ice and just inside the post.

Aside from swapping the roles of Hughes and Bratt, how much credit do we really want to give Burnette on a play like that?

I know someone above thought it was a set play, I kind of argued against that, maybe there is something to it, but it looks to me like players executing plays at a high level.

 

[My3Sons]

i think it was common practice for top of the pops

There was a law in England at that time (not sure if true anymore) that performances like that had to be live. Yes, lip synching was illegal. I guess the live singing was enough to comply and the backing track could be prerecorded?

 

[devilsblood]

I just have no faith in Blackwood. I don’t think he’s a good goalie.

Some people wanna make me feel a fool for doubting an .892% goalie over the last 61 games (hey! It went up a point! It was .891% before last night!) will be good again.

Or like I’m slandering a player that’s actually good like Jack Hughes or Nico.

Way better players have been shit talked on this board.

Vanecek has been the better goalie this regular season, preseason and last two seasons. Some people put way too much confidence into a goalie that hasn’t had more than a handful of good games in a row in close to 3 years.

Your ability to say the same things over and over again with such fervor is impressive.

 

[My3Sons]

Indeed.

Very exciting thus far.

And I look forward to Bratt hopefully breaking the Devils record this Thursday, too.

Let's go.

You do realize Higgins is going to be there with his extended family throwing rotten fruit, vegetables, and small domestic animals as Bratt to try to get him off his game and distract him. It might get ugly on the bench. I may have heard the team is bringing in a veterinarian, a bunch of cages of various sizes to handle the livestock, and a nutritionist to see if any of the produce is salvageable.

 

[Bleedred]

It's way too early for either of them to really steal the job.

Vanecek certainly has the advantage as he has the better stats this season & better recent track record. That being said, he's had 3 good games and one dogshit game compared to a 4/2 split for Blackwood. No one's really running away with this yet.

I expect Vanecek to get the start tomorrow night and the staff continue to evaluate the starter on a game-by-game basis unless we start to see some real separation between the two.

They do seem to favor Blackwood, as per the opening night start after Vanecek was the significantly superior goalie in preseason. Last night's comments by both Ruff and Blackwood would lead us to believe that he might have actually played another game since Washington if he weren't ''Nursing'' his ''Elbow'' or whatever they said.

I don't know why they favor Blackwood, as they should be more skeptical of him than anything and he hasn't really a done a whole lot to make anyone think that he's really who he was 3-4 seasons ago to this point, in neither the preseason, nor the regular season.

It's very obviously because he's both homegrown and showed a higher ceiling (3-4 years ago) than Vanecek has shown at any point in the NHL.

Your ability to say the same things over and over again with such fervor is impressive.

Your ability to doubt me and act like I don't know what the hell I'm talking about on these goalies (remember when Cory was gonna bounce back at 32-33 years old after multiple bad years? Yeah, you were definitely one of them) is more impressive than anything I can do.

Congrats.

I used to think maybe you defended McLeod a little too much, but now I know I was just too hard on him, as well as many other players, who have much less consequence to a team than a BAD goaltender.

 

[glenwo2]

Prior to last night Blackwood was 4-0 vs. Vancouver. He's now 5-0, with 2 shutouts. A 0.98 GAA and .962 save %. Those latter stats were higher prior to Horvat potting 2 goals last night.

Plus it was an out of conference game. VV can't play 'em all. You need Blackwood to come in and provide quality starts.

Prior to last night, the last time Blackwood played Vancouver was basically a million years ago....

...and he had stunk for several seasons since.

So excuse me if I was very SKEPTICAL that he wouldn't have similar success this time around.

Again....Lindy rolled the dice here when he didn't have to and risked losing a very winnable game by playing a very shaky Goaltender.

You saw that despite the mostly (for him) solid play, his shaky-ness was still there.

I half-joked pre-game that the Devils would need to score 5 goals to have a chance to win (and that's what they did) with him in net.


I mean....imagine if we had lost this game and it's because of Mac letting in a couple of softies....We'd be all raking Lindy over the coals for this decision to play him and we'd be staring down the possibility of losing the rest of the 3 remaining games against Western Canada teams (EDM, and CALGARY twice) as those two teams won't be easy games at all.

Again, I'm glad Mac managed to play well enough not to be a liability in this game for the Devils but I would have thrown him out there against the first Calgary game as a throwaway game while making sure we won the Vancouver one last night with Vitek.

Whatever. Lindy was very fortunate.

This next game against EDM is going to be quite the challenge....

 

[HBK27]

They do seem to favor Blackwood, as per the opening night start after Vanecek was the significantly superior goalie in preseason. Last night's comments by both Ruff and Blackwood would lead us to believe that he might have actually played another game since Washington if he weren't ''Nursing'' his ''Elbow'' or whatever they said.

I don't know why they favor Blackwood, as they should be more skeptical of him than anything and he hasn't really a done a whole lot to make anyone think that he's really who he was 3-4 seasons ago to this point, in neither the preseason, nor the regular season.

It's very obviously because he's both homegrown and showed a higher ceiling (3-4 years ago) than Vanecek has shown at any point in the NHL.

Yeah, I agree they are favoring Blackwood a bit - likely for the reasons you mentioned (homegrown, higher ceiling). Personally, I don't have a problem with that. Goalies are tricky mentally and I'm sure Ruff and the staff are trying to manage that aspect as best they can too. He doesn't even need to be the goalie he was a few seasons ago as even the average goaltending he provided last night should be enough to win most games.

 

[NjDevsRR]

During the broadcast, Sal talked about the play and apparently it was Hischier properly timing his drive to the net that distracted the defenders to open up Jack's lane to Bratt while Jack's pass to Bratt froze the defense enough to create the lane to Nico. Really one of those plays that you draw up on the board and don't expect to see too often in real life. Great work all around and really shows off the skill and nuance of all three players.

3 very pretty slam dunk goals yesterday

 

[HBK27]

Prior to last night, the last time Blackwood played Vancouver was basically a million years ago....

...and he had stunk for several seasons since.

So excuse me if I was very SKEPTICAL that he wouldn't have similar success this time around.

Again....Lindy rolled the dice here when he didn't have to and risked losing a very winnable game by playing a very shaky Goaltender.

You saw that despite the mostly (for him) solid play, his shaky-ness was still there.

I half-joked pre-game that the Devils would need to score 5 goals to have a chance to win (and that's what they did) with him in net.


I mean....imagine if we had lost this game and it's because of Mac letting in a couple of softies....We'd be all raking Lindy over the coals for this decision to play him and we'd be staring down the possibility of losing the rest of the 3 remaining games against Western Canada teams (EDM, and CALGARY twice) as those two teams won't be easy games at all.

Again, I'm glad Mac managed to play well enough not to be a liability in this game for the Devils but I would have thrown him out there against the first Calgary game as a throwaway game while making sure we won the Vancouver one last night with Vitek.

Whatever. Lindy was very fortunate.

This next game against EDM is going to be quite the challenge....

Not exactly "rolling the dice" when you have a 1A/1B goalie situation to put in the perceived worse of the two against the easiest opponent over the next 4 games.

We're gonna need both these guys this season. I don't think we're going to see many (perhaps any) 4 game stretches for either guy unless there's an injury.

 

[glenwo2]

It's way too early for either of them to really steal the job.

Vanecek certainly has the advantage as he has the better stats this season & better recent track record. That being said, he's had 3 good games and one dogshit game compared to a 4/2 split for Blackwood. No one's really running away with this yet.

I expect Vanecek to get the start tomorrow night and the staff continue to evaluate the starter on a game-by-game basis unless we start to see some real separation between the two.

Actually, Vitek has the massive advantage in that he's had 3 good games and one dogsh*t game compared to THE PAST SEVERAL SEASONS OF DOGSH*T for Blackwood.

 

[glenwo2]

Not exactly "rolling the dice" when you have a 1A/1B goalie situation to put in the perceived worse of the two against the easiest opponent over the next 4 games.

We're gonna need both these guys this season. I don't think we're going to see many (perhaps any) 4 game stretches for either guy unless there's an injury.

What was that @Bleedred said before?

Oh right.

They are trying to make "Blackwood" happen or something like that.

It's that thought process that will end up sinking this team if they(or rather Lindy) continue to believe that Blackwood is in any way, shape, or form a franchise goaltender.

As far as I'm concerned, this is Vitek's team.

And if Lindy doesn't start playing him 90% of the time (AT LEAST), this team won't go far at all this season.

 

[HBK27]

Actually, Vitek has the massive advantage in that he's had 3 good games and one dogsh*t game compared to THE PAST SEVERAL SEASONS OF DOGSH*T for Blackwood.

Vanecek hasn't been so hot the past few seasons either considering his former team gave up on him and dealt him to a division rival.

Again, we need both of these guys this season. Vanecek is not going to get 80% of the starts. It's more or less a split situation - not sure why you'd think Vanecek would all of the sudden be getting 7 straight starts. Was absolutely the right call for Ruff to play Blackwood last night. Now if Ruff were to go back to Blackwood tomorrow, I would have to question that move.

 

[severian]

I just have no faith in Blackwood. I don’t think he’s a good goalie.

Some people wanna make me feel a fool for doubting an .892% goalie over the last 61 games (hey! It went up a point! It was .891% before last night!) will be good again.

Or like I’m slandering a player that’s actually good like Jack Hughes or Nico.

Way better players have been shit talked on this board.

Vanecek has been the better goalie this regular season, preseason and last two seasons. Some people put way too much confidence into a goalie that hasn’t had more than a handful of good games in a row in close to 3 years.

I’m not disagreeing with you. But I don’t think there is an all that compelling case the Vanacek is head and shoulders above Blackwood. So until totally proven otherwise, Blackwood should still get a shot.

 

[HBK27]

What was that @Bleedred said before?

Oh right.

They are trying to make "Blackwood" happen or something like that.

It's that thought process that will end up sinking this team if they(or rather Lindy) continue to believe that Blackwood is in any way, shape, or form a franchise goaltender.

As far as I'm concerned, this is Vitek's team.

LOL...playing both goaltenders in an obvious 1A/1B situation is not trying to make "Blackwood" happen.

I'm almost getting the sense that you'd rather have seen them lose last night with Blackwood getting lit up so you could've been right.