GDT: TEN Wins in a Row Starts NOW - Rangers @ Devils, 5 PM, MSG+

[Zippy316]

But how can you say that? It HAS hurt us with him playing with Greene and facing the toughest competition.

The only reason it's not more evident is because our goalies have a .943 save percentage at even strength when Lovejoy is out there! That's why you (With all due respect) and Hynes and whoever else is fooled by Lovejoy not being bad while playing on the top lines.

Are you gonna argue the save percentage is a .943 because the goalies are facing lower quality shots when he's on the ice? How can you argue that it's not hurting us? We allow an absurd amount of shots almost every game and Lovejoy is a top suspect in that.

I'm not a Lovejoy fan, but the one thing he is very good at is defending in his own zone. Some of that is definitely to a fault as he doesn't take many risks to make plays, but I'd have to say the high save percentage is definitely indicative of the way he plays. Ideally, you want to have him in limited minutes with a guy capable of moving the puck out of the zone well, but the Devils don't have that luxury.

I'm saying that because I'm not sure any alternative on the team right now is better. Your options are Severson, Santini, Lovejoy, or Quincey. I'd rather bring Santini along slowly, so I'd keep him away from the top pair on a regular basis. Same goes for Severson, although I would like to see him get his shot eventually. Quincey is much, much better on the left side as well.

It's not like we have a definitive better option to play than Lovejoy. It's facing a high volume of shots with less high danger chances with Lovejoy or facing a lower volume of shots with Severson but potentially more high danger shots. I might be wrong on the numbers here, but I'd assume this is the case.

 

[Emperoreddy]

Debating about Hynes is pointless.

Whether you like him or not, odds are he won't be here by the time the team is a playoff regular again just by the nature of shelf lives in this league.

 

[Devils Dominion]

Cory is what he is, makes a lot of saves but he still hasn't proven to make the big save at the right time consistently.

Team stinks yes, LJ is a disaster turnover machine, and #35 is exposed way too much by awful D coverage, but it would have been nice for him to shut the door tonight once we took the lead.

 

[Devils Dominion]

Palms has a good shot but he passed instead of shot shortly after our 3rd goal.
He should have ripped it high glove hand on that 2 on 1.

Same in OT. Shoot the puck.

 

[Zippy316]

Debating about Hynes is pointless.

Whether you like him or not, odds are he won't be here by the time the team is a playoff regular again just by the nature of shelf lives in this league.

Agreed.

To me, I personally like him on the interim as he seems to instill that hard to play against and never give up mentality. Hopefully he can instill some good habits and help develop the young kids over the next couple years.

My prediction is that Bruce Boudreau is going to be the coach of this team in five years. Just seems like we're going to have the team set up to play exactly how he had Washington, Anaheim, and now Minnesota playing.

 

[Bleedred]

I'm not a Lovejoy fan, but the one thing he is very good at is defending in his own zone. Some of that is definitely to a fault as he doesn't take many risks to make plays, but I'd have to say the high save percentage is definitely indicative of the way he plays. Ideally, you want to have him in limited minutes with a guy capable of moving the puck out of the zone well, but the Devils don't have that luxury.

I'm saying that because I'm not sure any alternative on the team right now is better. Your options are Severson, Santini, Lovejoy, or Quincey. I'd rather bring Santini along slowly, so I'd keep him away from the top pair on a regular basis. Same goes for Severson, although I would like to see him get his shot eventually. Quincey is much, much better on the left side as well.

It's not like we have a definitive better option to play than Lovejoy. It's facing a high volume of shots with less high danger chances with Lovejoy or facing a lower volume of shots with Severson but potentially more high danger shots. I might be wrong on the numbers here, but I'd assume this is the case.

I don't think the high save percentage is indicative of his play at all, considering it's a career high. Only in 12 games played in 10-11 did he have a higher on ice save percentage than this season. I think it's luck that's got that high of an on ice save percentage. I don't think he's good in his end at all, as evidenced by us being pinned in for 45 seconds at a time when he's on.

If you wanna argue that he'd be good as a lower pairing guy, I'm not sure I'd buy it, but I'd understand it. He definitely has no business on a top pairing though. He gets crushed in possession when that happens, we get crushed in possession when that happens.

 

[Bleedred]

Debating about Hynes is pointless.

Whether you like him or not, odds are he won't be here by the time the team is a playoff regular again just by the nature of shelf lives in this league.

We can only hope he won't be here by the time we're ready to compete.

And if we are ready to compete, I'm not sure we'll be competing with him around. Could he coach the Pens to a playoff berth? I think so, along with about 6-9 other teams. I don't think he's a good head coach though and he's done nothing to show he is at this level. Even if you believe that he's not making the team worse than they are, there's no way he's making the team better. Which is something that a couple people are actually convinced that he is doing.

 

[Zippy316]

I don't think the high save percentage is indicative of his play at all, considering it's a career high. Only in 12 games played in 10-11 did he have a higher on ice save percentage than this season. I think it's luck that's got that high of an on ice save percentage. I don't think he's good in his end at all, as evidenced by us being pinned in for 45 seconds at a time when he's on.

If you wanna argue that he'd be good as a lower pairing guy, I'm not sure I'd buy it, but I'd understand it. He definitely has no business on a top pairing though. He gets crushed in possession when that happens, we get crushed in possession when that happens.

I don't think he belongs on the top pair either, but I don't think the other options are better.

The last part is my general point for everything you consistently complain about. Instead the same tired argument largely due to the Devils being a rebuilding team with poor depth, we could spend time talking about actual parts of the game instead of getting derailed by the same Hynes sucks, Lovejoy sucks, Kalinin sucks, (insert punching bag of the month) sucks.

By all means, be critical, but at least take a step back and look at the alternatives and realize there isn't much there.

 

[Bleedred]

I don't think he belongs on the top pair either, but I don't think the other options are better.

The last part is my general point for everything you consistently complain about. Instead the same tired argument largely due to the Devils being a rebuilding team with poor depth, we could spend time talking about actual parts of the game instead of getting derailed by the same Hynes sucks, Lovejoy sucks, Kalinin sucks, (insert punching bag of the month) sucks.

By all means, be critical, but at least take a step back and look at the alternatives and realize there isn't much there.

You and more than half of this board will never be convinced that Severson is a better option there than Lovejoy, so why should I bother? Hynes and Nasreddine probably won't either.

And people here accusing me of using these guys as punching bags, what player that was GOOD or USEFUL have I ever taken unnecessary shots at? The players I use as punching bags are ****ing awful. Kalinin was useless from day one, DSP is useless this year, Helgeson has always been useless and always will be useless at the NHL level, Lovejoy at the very least is useless as a top pairing guy. Gazdic? Does anyone here actually like him? Moore? One of the only guys on the entire team that 85% of this board can agree is awful? When have I ever used a useful player around here as a punching bags? The guys that are my punching bag are beyond worthless or at least worthless at this stage of their careers. Like Pandolfo, White and Zubrus in their twilight years.

You know the who most undeserved punching bag is around here? Severson. We've already had a post here earlier saying he'll be lucky to be a top 4 defenseman and then we had another poster who hadn't posted in almost 28 months, get on here to blame this loss on Severson. I believe the exact wording was ''The most overrated D man ever''?

 

[Triumph]

I don't get bent out of shape about Lovejoy because while he is awful on the top pair (or basically anywhere else), if you move Severson to the top pair, well now you've got Lovejoy with a worse defenseman than Greene. There is no depth on the defense. There is no solution to the problem.

 

[Devils Dominion]

We really could have used Zacha tonight.

Having both DSP & Noesen in the lineup is redundant and slows down team speed.

 

[Bleedred]

I don't get bent out of shape about Lovejoy because while he is awful on the top pair (or basically anywhere else), if you move Severson to the top pair, well now you've got Lovejoy with a worse defenseman than Greene. There is no depth on the defense. There is no solution to the problem.

You know what? I can understand this, that's a fair point. If you move Lovejoy to another pairing, he's with a worse defenseman than Greene. It would be like the Salvador-Volchenkov pairing from a few years ago, which was awful.

I can definitely see what you mean here and have no issue with this explanation. It's when the explanation is that Lovejoy is good is his own end (not true this year) or that there are no better options than Lovejoy to play with Greene (There are, but as you said, then you handicap another pairing) or that Lovejoy's high on ice save percentage is a testament to his strong defensive play, which going by his on ice save percentage historically, that doesn't appear to be the case.

 

[Bleedred]

We really could have used Zacha tonight.

Having both DSP & Noesen in the lineup is redundant and slows down team speed.

Noesen is fine, for now at least. DSP is awful and his one goal in 3 months last week, will probably keep him in the lineup for a bit longer.

I'm not gonna get too excited about Noesen, as he could be next year's DSP of this year, but he's fine for now.

DSP is a drain and is bordering Tootoo levels of incompetency in the defensive zone. And he barely provides any offense at all anymore. Maybe he's a little unlucky, but it's looking like he's every bit as bad as the player that he was in Anaheim and Montreal.

Still better than Matteau, but that isn't saying much.

 

[Devils Dominion]

Noesen is fine, for now at least. DSP is awful and his one goal in 3 months last week, will probably keep him in the lineup for a bit longer.

I'm not gonna get too excited about Noesen, as he could be next year's DSP of this year, but he's fine for now.

DSP is a drain and is bordering Tootoo levels of incompetency in the defensive zone. And he barely provides any offense at all anymore. Maybe he's a little unlucky, but it's looking like he's every bit as bad as the player that he was in Anaheim and Montreal.

Still better than Matteau, but that isn't saying much.

A second or two before he left Lindberg wide open on goal against #2, I said why is his stick over his head instead of on the ice.

We have too many forwards who not only don't score often but are also liabilities in the defensive zone.
DSP being one of them.

 

[Bleedred]

A second or two before he left Lindberg wide open on goal against #2, I said why is his stick over his head instead of on the ice.

We have too many forwards who not only don't score often but are also liabilities in the defensive zone.
DSP being one of them.

He looked like a high school player on that one.

Hynes seems to love having at least one of Kalinin or DSP at his disposal.

Shero gets rid of one of his pets in Kalinin? No problem, DSP will play every game now.

 

[Devils Dominion]

Hynes should have called timeout BTW.
Greene was gassed, they were pinned in due to LJ's failed clear.

 

[NJRockinRoller]

What's sad is that this was game 61 and against a bitter rival where we blew a third period lead. You would think this loss would be upsetting but it's actually comical. They can't even lose right.

Yup, and the 1 point is a waste. Team is so bad and so far away from competitiveness that the thought of accumulating points down the stretch here and ending up 8-9-10 in draft is equal parts scary and comical. They need to just bottom out, collect every asset they can on Wed and try to regroup.

 

[NJRockinRoller]

this team has no heart

While this is an obvious indictment of the captain, the post itself is acceptable on this board because the poster did not NAME the captain in it. If the captain was named, condemnation would rain.

 

[Devils Dominion]

I enjoyed the fast paced pond hockey in the 3rd until we got pinned in just prior to the allowed goal.

Just needed to get that 2 goal cushion and every Devils fan knew that.

 

[Cult of Hynes]

They've tried Severson on the top pairing a number of times this season, that hasn't worked either. And not for nothing it is getting old seeing 28 on the ice getting blown by for another OT losing goal.

Gets even older seeing our supposed top 5 goalie give up another soft goal.

Game doesn't even get to OT without Cory bailing them out in the 2nd, but whatever.

lets continue the mindless Cory, Hynes, Severson circle argument that goes no where.

Wonderful Cory did his job in the second and **** the bed in OT thanks to letting in a soft goal. He doesn't get exempt for being the reason they lost in OT just because he played well in the 2nd and kept them in it.

 

[Bleedred]

It's almost to the point where I expect to lose every time we go to OT now. I can't remember our last OT win. Seems like it was against Nashville back at the beginning of December. It can't be that long ago though? I know we had the shootout winner at the end of December against the Caps, when we were badly outplayed.

I almost think I'm forgetting an OT winner since the Nashville game, but maybe I'm not?

Last OT win was January 15th in Vancouver. I forgot about that one, but was pretty sure we had one since Nashville. We've since the Nashville game we've went 1-4 in OT. 2-4 if you count the shootout win against the Caps and that's our last shootout to date. All the way back on December 29th.

 

[Dylan9z9]

While this is an obvious indictment of the captain, the post itself is acceptable on this board because the poster did not NAME the captain in it. If the captain was named, condemnation would rain.

I take that back maybe a better word would have been skill....although after the failure of Palmeri to finish in OT they seemed to be happy with the one point....seems the Devils always will give up the tying goal with under 5 minutes to play go to overtime and then lose, it's almost as predictable as the sun rising in the morning.

 

[Devils Dominion]

I don't trust Cory to make the big save if we're only up 1 goal in the 3rd.
But, I also don't trust our defense to move the puck out of the zone nor do I have confidence our players will not screen Cory either.

We came close of scoring that 4th goal early in the 3rd but either didn't get a shot on net or Rannta made a big save.

*Sidenote, I'm surprised that Grabner did not score on us last night.

 

[Camille the Eel]

Cory is what he is, makes a lot of saves but he still hasn't proven to make the big save at the right time consistently.

Team stinks yes, LJ is a disaster turnover machine, and #35 is exposed way too much by awful D coverage, but it would have been nice for him to shut the door tonight once we took the lead.

How do we blame Cory on the tying goal? He didn't see the shot. His positioning looked fine, he was square to the puck and at the right spot, and if he can't see it that's the end of it.

Also don't blame him in OT. That was a brilliant shot - fake and finish by the Ranger forward who's name I can't spell. Zabindejad? Just a first class play on a first class chance. Taylor Hall-class finish in OT (where Taylor has won us a couple this year, and where even Greene slipped one between a goalie's pads to win in Buffalo - stuff happens in OT).

 

[devilsblood]

Debating about Hynes is pointless.

Whether you like him or not, odds are he won't be here by the time the team is a playoff regular again just by the nature of shelf lives in this league.

I think will be here to start next year, and I don't think it's crazy to say we could make the playoffs next year.

If we don't I expect he will not be here for year 4.