The Matchup: New Jersey Devils (16-12-1) @ Ottawa Senators (13-11-4)
The Time: 7:00pm ET
The Broadcast: MSGSN, Devils Radio Network
Last Devils Game
New Jersey travelled to Boston on Saturday to take on the Bruins. Despite Boston missing their two best players in David Pastrnak and Charlie MacAvoy, they put the Devils down by a 4-1 final score. Timo Meier scored the lone goal for New Jersey, which was notable considering it was the first goal the team had scored in three games.
Last Senators Game
Ottawa was also in action on Saturday night, falling 2-1 to the St. Louis Blues. Old friend Fabian Zetterlund was the lone goal-scorer for the Sens, while Linus Ullmark made 18 saves on 20 shots.
Offense In Freefall
The entire team is in freefall really, but the offense has been hit especially hard. Timo Meier’s first period goal on Saturday was the first time New Jersey found the back of the net since last Monday. In their last three games, they’ve been shut out by the Dallas Stars, shut out by the Vegas Golden Knights, and scored once against a really, really bad Bruins roster. It’s true that Jeremy Swayman is a very good goalie, but the Devils had trouble generating much offense regardless of who was in net on Saturday. So even if an average goalie was in net, New Jersey still would’ve had trouble winning.
A season after depth scoring was nowhere to be found and was arguably the single biggest issue the team had, it appeared as though that problem was mostly solved early in the year. But now the depth scoring has dried up again, to the point where we’re getting crazy stats like these:
I want to be positive, I really do. And if I’m trying to be logically positive, I would say that while New Jersey has not played great over their current five-game losing streak, they have not played as poorly as the results would indicate. They’ve been goalie’d, they’ve gotten terrible luck, they’ve been the victims of horrible officiating in spots. All of that is true. And I’m also very confident that this poor run of results will not go on forever. The Devils will win again, I promise you that. But for now, they’re fading fast, and the offense is mostly to blame.
We Talkin’ ‘Bout Practice
Let’s go over the Devils’ practice yesterday, because it was an interesting sight. We’ll start with the lineup:
According to Stein, Hischier, Meier, and Bratt were all taking maintenance days. Stein explicitly said Hischier will be ready to play tonight, while she later tweeted that head coach Sheldon Keefe had this to say about Meier and Bratt:
For a team already starved for offense, missing one of Meier or Bratt would be bad enough. But missing BOTH of them? Disastrous. We’ll wait and see what their statuses are as we get closer to gametime, but even if they do play, you have to wonder how effective they’ll be if they’re this banged up.
As for the players who did practice, apparently Keefe saw fit to work on generating offense in the hard areas of the ice:
I can certainly appreciate this. The Devils just have not been able to get to the inside in recent games. Everything is either from the perimeter, or a failed attempt to get to the slot or net front. “Traffic, tips, rebounds” sounds like a good thing to work on to me, this team absolutely needs to work harder to get to the dangerous areas of the ice.
Finally, Keefe gave a non-update update on Jack Hughes:
Not much to read into there I suppose.
Speaking of key injuries though, we did get one little nugget from The Hockey News’ Kristy Flannery:
Again, who knows how much to read into this. But if Brett Pesce’s return is on the horizon, that would be a gigantic boost to this team. He was having an excellent start to the season before his injury, and beyond his own game, he seems to be the key to bringing out the best in Luke Hughes, who hasn’t been the same since Pesce went down. Obviously it’s not ideal for the Devils’ young, up-and-coming face of the blueline (not to mention a player with a new $9m cap hit) to be reliant on another player to be an impact defenseman. But the reality is that Hughes seems to need Pesce at this point in his career, so we can only hope Pesce returns soon and picks up right where he left off with Hughes.
State Of The Senators
With 30 points in 28 games played, Ottawa currently sits in 15th place in the Eastern Conference, ahead of only the Buffalo Sabres. Losers of five of their last seven contests, the Sens have not exactly been able to build off the momentum from last season’s playoff appearance, the franchise’s first since 2016-17. Needless to say, it’s been a disappointing start to the campaign, even if Ottawa is far from out of it.
So what seems to be plaguing the Senators this season? Well according to Natural Stat Trick, it does not appear to be their ability to drive play at 5-on-5:
Corsi For%: 51.99 (9th in the NHL)
Scoring Chances For%: 53.52 (6th)
High Danger Corsi For%: 52.74 (10th)
Expected Goals For%: 53.60 (5th)
I would not go so far as to call Ottawa a sleeping giant, but I would definitely say they are playing better than their middling record would lead you to believe. Then again, perhaps public models are overrating the Senators a tad:
This chart was from last Monday so it’s possible Ottawa’s position may have shifted a little bit. But as of the beginning of the month, they were deemed to be overrated by public models according to SportLogiq.
So when a team looks better under the hood than they do on the standings page, one of the first things to check for is a low PDO. And sure enough, Ottawa is rocking an all-situations PDO of .982, the 6th-worst mark in the league. Is this due to poor shooting? Actually no, as Ottawa is middle of the pack in terms of shooting percentage this year.
And that brings us to the Senators’ fatal flaw.
Ottawa’s goaltending has been absolutely abysmal this season. In their 28 games played, the Sens are rocking an unfathomable team save percentage of .877%. That’s good for 31st in the league, ahead of only the Edmonton Oilers.
The dispiriting thing is that the acquisition of Linus Ullmark prior to last season was supposed to solve Ottawa’s longstanding goaltending troubles, but instead he’s been a huge part of the problem. The 2022-23 Vezina Trophy winner enters tonight’s contest with a mediocre but reasonable 10-7-4 record, but an atrocious .877 save percentage. In fact, he leads the entire league in goals allowed with 64.
The baffling thing is that Ullmark’s numbers don’t look so bad if you dig a little deeper. According to Natural Stat Trick, Ullmark is sporting a Goals Saved Above Expected mark of 0.05. Yes, despite a save percentage of .877, NST has deemed Ullmark to be above average as far as goaltending performance based on difficulty is concerned. This makes very little sense to me considering Ottawa is not an especially leaky defensive team. In fact, some of their rate stats are positively elite, with league-leading Scoring Chances Against per 60 and Expected Goals Against per 60 numbers at 5-on-5.
But Natural Stat Trick is not the be-all, end-all, and wouldn’t you know it, other outlets have Ullmark significantly in the red. According to Moneypuck, Ullmark is currently at -10.3 GSAA. Hockey Reference has him at -11.1. So while NST is kind to Ullmark, other models are not. And considering his save percentage is .877, I tend to side with the metrics that say Ullmark has been one of the worst goaltenders in the league this season.
As far as Ullmark’s tandem-mate, Leevi Merilainen hasn’t been so hot either. In seven games played, Merilainen is 3-4-0 with a .876 save percentage. He’s about breakeven in GSAA according to Natural Stat Trick, but he’s at -3.6 per Moneypuck, and -4.1 per Hockey Reference.
I’m not sure who will start tonight for the Sens, but whoever it is, the Devils better be able to score on them. Enough is enough, if they can’t score on goalies playing this poorly, then there’s no hope for New Jersey’s offense.
Players To Watch And Projected Lineup
As mentioned, Ottawa’s record might not be so hot, but they have plenty of players that New Jersey needs to be wary of. Leading the way in total points are Drake Batherson and Tim “The Diver” Stutzle with 24 apiece. Jake Sanderson is right on their heels with 23. By the way, be prepared to see a LOT of Sanderson this evening considering he’s logging a whopping 24:56 per game this season (including over 31 minutes on Saturday).
Ottawa’s leader in goals is their fourth-place point-getter this season, Shane Pinto. The Long Island native enters with 12 goals in 27 games. We won’t see him tonight, however, as it was recently announced that he will be out a couple weeks with a lower-body injury.
Elsewhere, Ottawa’s captain and one of the dirtiest players in the league, Brady Tkachuk, is back after missing significant time due to injury earlier this season. In eight games played, Tkachuk has one goal and six assists. When Tkachuk is on the ice, the Devils better be on the lookout due to his skill and his penchant for cheap shots.
As far as the rest of the roster, here’s how the Sens lined up in practice yesterday:
Apparently Sanderson was just taking a maintenance day, so expect to see him tonight.
Your Take
Is tonight the night New Jersey snaps their losing streak? What do you want to see out of the team? Who individually needs to step up in your eyes? Who on the Senators will you be watching the closest tonight? As always, thanks for reading!