Pucks and Pitchforks
Fansided

New Jersey Devils: Travis Zajac Might Be Key To Team’s Turnaround

By Nick Villano

NEWARK, NEW JERSEY - NOVEMBER 15: Travis Zajac #19 of the New Jersey Devils celebrates his goal with teammates on the bench in the first period against the Pittsburgh Penguins at Prudential Center on November 15, 2019 in Newark, New Jersey. (Photo by Elsa/Getty Images)
NEWARK, NEW JERSEY - NOVEMBER 15: Travis Zajac #19 of the New Jersey Devils celebrates his goal with teammates on the bench in the first period against the Pittsburgh Penguins at Prudential Center on November 15, 2019 in Newark, New Jersey. (Photo by Elsa/Getty Images) /
facebooktwitterreddit

The New Jersey Devils beat the Pittsburgh Penguins on Friday Night partially thanks to Travis Zajac’s first-period goal. Getting him out of his scoring slump would be important to getting the Devils going this season.

Travis Zajac has regressed from a major bounce-back season. He looked like the Zajac of old for the New Jersey Devils last season. In fact, he was one of the only Devils who was excelling last season, hitting 46 points and playing 80 games as a defensive-minded center with offensive upside.

This season, however, that scoring touch just isn’t there. On Friday night, he scored his second goal of the season. It was his first goal that meant anything, because his actual first goal came in a 5-1 deficit to the Buffalo Sabres.

He’s not even getting helpers. Zajac only has three assists on the season. This is a player that spent time on the power play, and it clearly wasn’t working. Before Friday night, Zajac went ten games without a point. It seemed like him and Blake Coleman went on consecutive slumps, as they were both deeply entrenched in a cold streak. It doesn’t help that they’ve been playing with a turnstile on the left wing, but that’s every line for the Devils right now.

Zajac had been saying he knew how important it was for him to get his offense going. He’s currently on pace for the second worst CF% of his career (currently on pace for 45.8%). At 5v5 right now, Zajac has been on the ice for an equal amount of high-danger chances for and against. That sounds good on paper, but this is the player that’s supposed to shut down those top lines.

More from Pucks and Pitchforks

Zajac is actually playing a much shorter workload. He’s playing 16:38 per game, which is about 2:30 less than his career average and more than three minutes below last year’s average. It’s interesting to see the different ways that head coach John Hynes has used him. He still has him against the top lines most of the time, but he’s actually been starting Zajac a lot, and even used him in some must score situations. We’re not sure if that’s the best utilization of Zajac, but what do we know.

The Devils made major moves in the offseason to bring in secondary scoring. That was supposed to compliment the likes of Zajac, Coleman and Miles Wood, but they cannot seem to consistently keep scoring with the likes of Wayne Simmonds, Jesper Boqvist and Nikita Gusev. Everybody is just on a different page every night.

Zajac isn’t the Devils biggest problem, but he could be the team’s biggest solution. If Zajac can get his offense going, then that means he’s keeping the Devils out of their own zone. That’s the Devils biggest problem. They continue to get blasted in their own zone, and they can’t seem to keep the puck in the offensive zone. If at least Zajac and his line can give them some time in the offensive zone, then the Devils could use that momentum to get their top six scoring.

This was just one game, but getting that goal for Zajac was important. Ending bad streaks like that can end in good streaks. Just ask Cory Schneider, the master of the streak. One win can lead to two which can lead to six. The same goes for goals. Hopefully this turns into a major hot streak for the Devils third-line center.

Home/Editorials