GDT: Devils vs. Canucks - Hughes vs. Hughes - 1:00 PM MSG+

[Tretyak 20]

Boston is best team we've played. Buffalo? Get back to me in December when they're done reacting to a new coach.

 

[Call Me Al]

it doesn’t matter how they do in december as far as our record is concerned. edmonton too- they are playing good hockey right now and beating good teams right now and that’s when we lost to them.

if they fall back to earth and play bad in december then we can cry about them beating us then, but there’s no point to needlessly try to take other teams down a peg when they are by all measures playing well right now

 

[MauDevils]

Edmonton is a good team? I haven't laughed that hard in a while.

 

[Call Me Al]

they're 7-1 right now. that's pretty good to me. are they going to keep it up? who knows. but this idea that "they were bad last year so logically they are always going to be bad" seems kind of silly to me. if they're winning games and playing good hockey right now they are a good team

 

[AfroThunder396]

Buffalo Sabres: Back to back October Champions. We are truly witnessing history.

 

[Tretyak 20]

Facts are facts. We've only played two playoff teams so far, and while you can argue that Buffalo has improved, you can also argue the Jets and Bruins got worse.

If the Devils want to improve and find a way to make the playoffs, they will have to find a way to beat teams that aren't making the playoffs. Do you foresee any of last year's playoff teams in the East falling out? Maybe Columbus or NYI, but I doubt any others. We're just compounding our problems by losing to bottom dwellers.

 

[Offseason Champs]

I'm getting whiplash from these goalposts moving all over the place in this thread.

Winnipeg is a good team
Buffalo is 7-1-1
The Flyers are awful
Edmonton is 7-1
The Bruins are a good team
The Panthers are average
The Rangers are awful
Vancouver is average

Vancouver was also riding a 4 game winning streak last I checked and Demko was 2-0 with under 2 GAA and we managed a shutout win against them.
The schedule has been pretty brutal with two back to backs and several very good or very hot teams that we played against. Of those teams it would be kind of crazy to argue that the Jets and Bruins are likely playoff teams, Edmonton/Vancouver/Florida/Buffalo are all at the least bubble teams, and the Rangers/Flyers are probably on outside of the playoff picture. So that's 6/8 games against "good" teams. Even if they aren't all "good" by game 82 they're "good" at game 8.

If people want to diminish the two wins this team has eked out then that's your prerogative. However I agree with the whole building blocks idea. We were godawful on the PK and killed off 13 chances in two games against two teams that do not have a lack of top flight scorers to put on a powerplay. We also have two PPG in two games - I mean special teams is the reason we won the Vancouver game instead of lost it like we did in many other games so far this year.

If you aren't at least a little bit happy with some of the improvement over the past two games and wins then I just wonder if all you wanna do is find someone or something to complain about. Is the situation perfect? No. But it's improving. To deny that is to be willfully blind and spiteful.

And yeah. To be a good team you need to be able to beat bad teams, and at the end of the day it's 2 points in the only column that matters. Perspective.

 

[Billdo]

The logic that teams will fall off, while true, doesn't really matter now. At this point in the year both Edmonton and Buffalo, are RIGHT NOW good teams. It doesn't matter that it's not sustainable over the course of the year. They're good teams right now and we lost to both. Who cares what they'll be in a few months.

 

[NjDevsRR]

The logic that teams will fall off, while true, doesn't really matter now. At this point in the year both Edmonton and Buffalo, are RIGHT NOW good teams. It doesn't matter that it's not sustainable over the course of the year. They're good teams right now and we lost to both. Who cares what they'll be in a few months.

Ding ding ding

 

[Whaddagoal]

Edmonton is a good team? I haven't laughed that hard in a while.

We were very close to beating them that game earlier this year (if we didn't blow the last 2 mins from the mcDive...

They are probably slightly overachieving...

 

[SpeakingOfTheDevils]

The logic that teams will fall off, while true, doesn't really matter now. At this point in the year both Edmonton and Buffalo, are RIGHT NOW good teams. It doesn't matter that it's not sustainable over the course of the year. They're good teams right now and we lost to both. Who cares what they'll be in a few months.

For how much this board loves analyzing in a vacuum (especially when it's inappropriate), you'd think this logic would come naturally.

 

[BenedictGomez]

this reminds me... I noticed a few times that Coleman was kicked out of the faceoff circle and Zajac replaced him. Is this a strategy or is Zajac nursing an injury and avoiding certain faceoff situations?

Good point. Zajac has been uncharacteristically miserable this year at faceoffs, and he was 7/19 the other day. I wonder.

 

[Devils731]

Good point. Zajac has been uncharacteristically miserable this year at faceoffs, and he was 7/19 the other day. I wonder.

the refs kicked the Devils out of the faceoff circle a lot.

the devils prioritize their faceoff men take them on their strong side but with lots of ejections it causes more draws taken by guys on their weak side.

devils winger also won only a few of the 50/50 draws.

 

[glenwo2]

Agreed, Arizona will be an eye opener..they are quite good so far.

I have a feeling that if the Devils beat Arizona, the same particular fans here would say "eh...'Zona wasn't all that good a team anyway"

You know that's going to happen, Jason.

 

[Tretyak 20]

I'm getting whiplash from these goalposts moving all over the place in this thread.

Winnipeg is a good team
Buffalo is 7-1-1
The Flyers are awful
Edmonton is 7-1
The Bruins are a good team
The Panthers are average
The Rangers are awful
Vancouver is average

Vancouver was also riding a 4 game winning streak last I checked and Demko was 2-0 with under 2 GAA and we managed a shutout win against them.
The schedule has been pretty brutal with two back to backs and several very good or very hot teams that we played against. Of those teams it would be kind of crazy to argue that the Jets and Bruins are likely playoff teams, Edmonton/Vancouver/Florida/Buffalo are all at the least bubble teams, and the Rangers/Flyers are probably on outside of the playoff picture. So that's 6/8 games against "good" teams. Even if they aren't all "good" by game 82 they're "good" at game 8.

If people want to diminish the two wins this team has eked out then that's your prerogative. However I agree with the whole building blocks idea. We were godawful on the PK and killed off 13 chances in two games against two teams that do not have a lack of top flight scorers to put on a powerplay. We also have two PPG in two games - I mean special teams is the reason we won the Vancouver game instead of lost it like we did in many other games so far this year.

If you aren't at least a little bit happy with some of the improvement over the past two games and wins then I just wonder if all you wanna do is find someone or something to complain about. Is the situation perfect? No. But it's improving. To deny that is to be willfully blind and spiteful.

And yeah. To be a good team you need to be able to beat bad teams, and at the end of the day it's 2 points in the only column that matters. Perspective.

Please let me know what teams you think the Devils are better than? If you want to use only the last eight games, we're only better than five other teams. That means that Shero's rebuild has completely failed. Five years and virtually no improvement? The implication is ownership needs to fire the coaching staff and the entire front office. Five years and ZERO progress is unacceptable. Is that your point?

 

[Call Me Al]

dude we’re 8 games into the season

 

[Blackjack]

I don't know about you guys, but it seems really obvious to me that the team, even after these two wins, is still not firing on all cylanders. I expect much better performances out of Bratt, Gusev, Hischier... ahh this is stupid, EVERYONE except Zacha, Butcher, Coleman, and maybe Vatanen. Whatever the quality of the teams they beat, they beat them despite ongoing disfunctions that I fully expect will be ironed out one way or another.

I'm actually glad they have a week off, whatever momentum they lose is less important than the opportunity for the players and coaching staff to spend some time improving the problem areas.

 

[Emperoreddy]

I get the impression a few people rather we didn’t win these games.

 

[New Jersey]

lol, now that we've won a couple of games, I guess now's the time to complain about which games we won.

What a funny place this is.

Me, I couldn't imagine *choosing* to be that miserable, like, literally making a conscious decision to choose the misery route, but that's just me.

 

[AfroThunder396]

A bad team can have a good game and win. A good team can have a bad game and lose. Buffalo was a bottom-5 team last year and still managed to have a 10 game winning streak. Didn't we start last season winning our first 6 in a row or something?

There are 1,271 NHL games played in the regular season. Weird shit happens.

 

[Triumph]

A bad team can have a good game and win. A good team can have a bad game and lose. Buffalo was a bottom-5 team last year and still managed to have a 10 game winning streak. Didn't we start last season winning our first 6 in a row or something?

There are 1,271 NHL games played in the regular season. Weird **** happens.

When you get .850 goaltending over 6 games, it starts to seem like a bad team cannot ever win a game.

 

[Auto Pilot]

Let’s see how this team performs on the road.