The story of the 2019-20 New Jersey Devils is eerily similar to the film ‘Groundhog Day,’ where every third period lead redundantly slips away. For at least one game, the MacKenzie Blackwood-led Devils changed the narrative by preserving a late lead in a must win game against the short handed Pittsburgh Penguins. In spite of solid all around contributions on both ends of the ice from Travis Zajac and Blake Coleman, this game was won solely by Blackwood’s stellar performance.
While Pittsburgh is not short on talent in spite of missing key contributors in Sidney Crosby, Kris Letang and Patric Hornqcvist; it was titilating to see how they managed to control the tempo of the game in the second and third period without those three players.
Blackwood stymied the Penguins in those two frames by making an astounding 25 of 26 saves; with a majority of those saves coming from sloppy play and turnovers in the Devils’ zone.
Coach John Hynes continued to juggle the lines to spark a club that has had trouble scoring heading into the game against Pittsburgh. The moves failed to pay dividends as the team was only able to muster 21 shots on goal, two of them being goals. More often than not in today’s NHL, that is not good enough to win many games, no matter how good the goaltending is.
More from Pucks and Pitchforks
- Should New Jersey Devils Try Load Management With Vitek Vanecek?
- New Jersey Devils Will Prove That Last Year Wasn’t A Fluke
- New Jersey Devils: Luke Hughes’ Playmaking Will Outshine His Mistakes
- New Jersey Devils: Chase Stillman’s Performance Causes Concern
- Can Devils Fans Separate Zach Parise Heartbreak From Achievements?
Hopefully the Devils could find it’s scoring touch against the Montreal Canadians and a goaltender that they are all too familiar with. In the likelihood event that Keith Kinkaid starts in net for Montreal, the Devils should be chopping at the bits to face off against their former teammate. Through three starts, Kinkaid is sporting a 4.35 goals against average and a .879 save percentage.
Throughout the short season, the Devils have found themselves on the wrong end of games that they could have won. The Devils finally won a game that they had no business winning; in an un-Devils like manner by protecting a third period lead, courtesy of the calm, cool and collective goaltender MacKenzie Blackwood.