New Jersey Devils: Key Pieces and Impact Players Second Half Push

The New Jersey Devils look to get their best players back in the lineup when John Marino is finally ready to return and Nathan Bastian practicing with the team again. Novozinsky tweeted John Marino will go on the club’s west coast trip starting with the Anaheim Ducks. Miles Wood got hurt at practice, but he’s in the lineup on Tuesday night. John Marino, and Nathan Bastian are not, but they should soon.
For clarity, Amanda Stein of the New Jersey Devils gave the necessary updates Monday.

If all three players are healthy and ready to get back into action soon, it makes the Devils’ journey to the playoffs much easier. As Bastian gets back to being gameday-ready, look for him to be trucking along similarly to Jeff Carter, They have similar hulking upper body strength, they are hard to push off the puck, and they make it harder to get in and out of the zone.

Nathan Bastian brings that defensive player’s worst nightmare because he’s so sturdy and is a goalie screen-type guy too. The way Bastian and Miles Wood work together, they are very similar types of value to a franchise. Wood is the guy that will tenderize defenses and fatigue opponents throughout the game with his speed. Nathan Bastian is the guy that opposing coaches want their defenders to shove away from the goalie crease because he’s going to capitalize on the puck in and around the crease. Either way, these two players will exhaust their opponent.

Getting John Marino back would do a lot of help with the New Jersey Devils defensive core look something like Ryan Graves-Dougie Hamilton, Jonas Siegenthaler-John Marino, Nikita Okhotiuk-Damon Severson.

Eventually, Simon Nemec will jump into the lineup when the Devils move on from Severson. That’s another story for another day. John Marino coming back brings a balance of two-way hockey and a playoff leader that Devils fans all gush over for the way he’s been playing for Jersey’s team.

Things are set up for Lindy Ruff and staff to have fresh players coming back will only help this team win another 66% of their games. Having a bountiful amount of skill and depth players coming back in the near term adds a lot of tools in Lindy Ruff’s toolbox to improve things rather than not having to fix conundrums.

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Yes, the Devils still have to keep working the West Coast swing after they play in Raleigh, North Carolina. They come off a big overtime win versus a rival Rangers team, and the Devils are determined to add more points to make it harder for outside Metro and Eastern Conference teams to try and move them down from their playoff seeding.