The New Jersey Devils don't often lose as of late. They have won 13 of their past 20 games going into Sunday night's tilt with the Colorado Avalanche. The Avs were on the second half of a back-to-back, so many thought the Devils should be the favorite at home. However, the Devils have this issue with playing how they should on nights that make the most sense.
The Devils have not allowed us to get over the hump on them as contenders. And Sunday night was the main reason the hype train couldn't leave the station. For every destruction of the New York Rangers that sends them into a tailspin, there's this type of night where nothing goes right, and the team follows suit with how they play.
Things started decently in how the Devils played, as the Jack Hughes-Jesper Bratt line was playing lights out. They got close to scoring multiple times, and the team even had two goals in the net in the first period. Unfortunately, both goals were waived off, and it seemed like the team was playing for the next game after that.
The New Jersey Devils were shut out again on Sunday night. This is officially a problem.
With Scott Wedgewood in net, many expected the former Devils' goalie curse to hit. For whatever reason, no matter how well or not well the player has been this season, if a former Devils goalie is in net, the Devils will be terrible. Maybe it's doing a solid for a friend, but it's getting old.
The Devils were shut out by Wedgewood, putting up 26 saves on what ended up being a very simple night. He only faced two shots in an important second period. Pretty much, the Devils put their entire effort into the first period, and it was hard to get them back up after the second goal was overturned.
The real question that's on everyone's mind is, what gives? Why do the Devils keep getting shut out? Of the Devils last seven losses, five are in shutout form. That's preposterous. The Devils were dreadful last season, and they were shut out four times all season. The 2022-23 Devils were never shut out. Ever. Not once.
It's December 8th, and this Devils team has been shut out five times this season. With how well the Devils have been playing, one could say this is a fluke, but five is a trend. This has happened enough to warrant an investigation.
When looking at the five shutouts, a few stats pop out. The Devils have fewer than 10 high-danger chances in each shutout. The Devils average 9.25 HDCF at 5v5 over its first 30 games. Basically, the Devils are below their average in each shutout loss. That's not too big a surprise. It does show that they aren't being "goalied" in each loss. It does have a lot to do with how they play.
It seems teams go into the third period against the Devils with a very clear objective: keep them off the board. Some teams against other opponents would try to keep the foot on the gas, but that's not the case here. The Devils have given up less than 0.25 xGA in the third period in four of their five shutouts. That includes a Sharks shutout where they clung to a 1-0 lead the entire time.
Teams are playing a certain style to shut down the Devils when they haven't scored yet. They are playing to frustrate the Devils, and in turn, that is making it harder for the Devils to capitalize on mistakes. If they are focusing on what's not going right, it's harder to focus on what they actually can control.
That's also easy to see. Teams don't focus on keeping the puck in the offensive zone; they focus on getting the puck off a rushing Devils player's stick. They want to make it harder to skate and avoid momentum entirely. They want to play as boring a game as possible. And it's been working. The Devils can't break through when a team goes into this mode where it's survival by suppression.
The fix seems to be in the coaching. Sheldon Keefe needs to find a way to break through the style of play that happens in the third period of a game where the Devils haven't scored. He should have a different style of play himself. The forecheck doesn't matter when the other team isn't trying to drive offense. So, Keefe needs to draw up an offense where the opponent is drawn in to make mistakes with the puck. That's how to end this shutout nonsense.