Prior to defeating the Edmonton Oilers over the weekend, the last four game winning streak that the New Jersey Devils enjoyed was almost three years ago and over 1000 days ago.
From January 7th, 2023 to January 16th, 2023, the Devils picked up victories over the New York Rangers (home), Carolina Hurricanes, Anaheim Ducks, and Los Angeles Kings (those last three on the road). For good measure, the 2022-23 Devils team finished off the California road trip with a win in San Jose, extending that streak to five games. Prior to this weekend, in situations where the Devils had won three games in a row, the Devils were 0-14 when going for that fourth consecutive win.
It was one of the weirder quirks when it comes to this team in recent memory. It covered a span of over 200 regular season and postseason games and 31 months. It covered a team that enjoyed the best regular season in franchise history, a team that was infuriatingly disappointing to the point where a coaching change was needed, last year’s team that showed a lot of promise in the first half of the season only to be maddeningly inconsistent in the second half of the year, and the very beginning of this season.
In the NHL, almost every team goes on a run at some point. Even the worst teams can find ways to win four games in a row by accident. Its something the Devils did in the mid 2010s with some truly dreadful hockey teams, and while some of that can be credited to getting good goaltending from Cory Schneider, some of it is also simply that the team had a hot week and picked up a win or two somewhere along the line that they probably weren’t supposed to get. Sometimes you catch the right team at the end of a long road trip, or you go on a shooting bender, or you play a team on the back end of a back-to-back when you’re rested, or whatever the circumstance is.
Last season alone, 29 of the 32 teams managed to string four wins together at some point. The only teams that failed to do so were Chicago, Philadelphia, and San Jose. And the Devils, of course. Who, by the way, extended that win streak to five games (and counting?) with last night’s win in Toronto.
Some might ask why does any of this matter or why I’m harping on this now that the 0-14 stretch of futility is over? After all, four is kind of an arbitrary number to pick in the first place. Its a small sample size over the course of an 82 game regular season, and its not like the Devils haven’t had stretches over the last two and a half seasons where they’ve played really good hockey and won, say, six out of seven games (something they’ve done twice in that span).
One of my big themes with this Devils team this season is going to be the maturation process of this group. It’s something that was already on my radar given the young core, and given the fact they appear to have a roadblock they still eventually need to learn how to clear in Carolina.
But after listening to the postgame interviews the other night after their win over Edmonton, consider this quote from Brett Pesce, who seemed surprised when he was informed that the Devils had gone as long as they did without winning four games in a row.
“Whoa, that’s crazy! Yeah, I guess it goes just back to maturity. That’s a crazy stat. Like I said, we trust our structure, we trust our game and no matter what happens, we’re not gonna get rattled.”
Jack Hughes, who is one of seven Devils players on the roster who had been here through that entire 0-14 stretch, added this after the Edmonton win.
“I feel like that’s pretty weird cause we don’t really think about it in this locker room but definitely nice to do that. You want to be one of those teams that can go on a crazy streak here and there throughout the regular season. I think that’s something we’ve been missing in the past. I think it was two or three years since we’ve done that, right? Nice that we can build a little streak and build off of it.”
The Devils might still be relatively young but their core pieces are at the stage of their careers where they’re no longer rookies. Nico Hischier and Jesper Bratt are in their 9th season as NHL players. Jonas Siegenthaler is in his 8th NHL season. Jack Hughes is in Year 7. Dawson Mercer is in Year 5. Luke Hughes is inching closer to 200 NHL games played while Simon Nemec is approaching 100. Their two young franchise defensemen are barely of drinking age.
The Devils roster should have enough experience as professionals to know how to navigate the ebbs and flows of the regular season at this point. That doesn’t necessarily mean the Devils will be ‘on’ every night they play. Some teams aren’t great matchups for them. Some games will be a grind and a battle. Sometimes, you just flat out get beat. Sometimes, the opposing goaltender is locked in and you’re just not beating him on that night. It’s a long season. That’ll happen. But I do think the maturation process matters, and I think you saw some of that in the Tampa win after a rough season opening loss in Carolina to avoid an 0-2 start. I think you saw some of that in the home opener against Florida with how they navigated that game. I think you saw some of that against Edmonton, and I certainly think you saw some of that against Toronto.
Going back to the Edmonton game, the Devils didn’t get off to a great start as they mostly bent but didn’t break in the first period. They got outshot early, but it wasn’t exactly the highest danger, high quality chances. Jake Allen was up to the task and the Devils did enough defensively to get to the room 0-0 after 20 minutes against the two-time Western Conference Champion Edmonton Oilers. A team that still has two very dangerous players in Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl.
But then the second period happened, and once again, the Devils outplayed one of the better teams in the league over the final 40 minutes.
The Devils didn’t panic or hang their heads just because they were down a goal. And it all started with a strong defensive effort that ultimately limited two of the best players in the world in McDavid and Draisaitl to a measly four shots on goal and no goals (although McDavid did pick up two assists later in the game). Once Jack Hughes split the Oilers defense for a highlight reel goal, it was on. The Devils generated quality chance after quality chance, kept Edmonton on the defensive, and ultimately came away with the win. Was it perfect? No. A good team like Edmonton is going to get their chances and it was a one-goal game entering the third. But the Devils stuck with it, played their game, added insurance goals, and the right team got the two points.
Fast forward to last night against Toronto and it’s a similar situation. Toronto scores the early goal, but that was really more of an experienced player in John Tavares making a great play batting in a puck out of mid air than anything specific that the Devils did wrong. And even with that, the Devils outplayed the Leafs for the majority of the game. They scored their goals seemingly in the blink of an eye in the second period. They kept attacking throughout most of the third period in waves, line after line. They made good plays defensively with their sticks, they were able to catch the Leafs flat-footed in transition, and they wore Toronto down with their speed. Again, was it perfect? No. Toronto had their chances in the final minutes thanks to a power play, and Jake Allen had to make a highlight reel save to keep the Leafs an arm’s distance away. But for the most part, they played as good a third period as one could play while protecting a lead.
Some might look at the fancy stats and suggest that they’re not playing all that well or there are underlying issues under the hood. And perhaps there is some semblance of truth to that. After all, six games is still a small sample size, and I was surprised after the game that Toronto had more xG than the Devils did when looking at Natural Stat Trick. But its also fair to point out that the Devils have played a gauntlet of a schedule thus far. When you pick up five wins in six games over some of the best teams in the league….teams that are more than capable of making a push and winning on any given night in this league….I’m going to cut the Devils a little bit of slack if the Corsi or xG isn’t up to par. I don’t think the Devils winning anyways necessarily means ‘the process’ is flawed, and I’ve always been of the mindset that REAL goals will always mean more than EXPECTED goals anyways.
That to me speaks volumes about the maturation of this group. The fact that we can go out there and nitpick certain things even though the team is 5-1. The fact that they’re 5-1 but have they really scratched the surface yet of playing their best hockey? The fact that they’re winning games, against the top teams in the league, and still having room for growth?
That is the sign of what should be a good hockey team in 2025-26.
Maybe that next step for this group is to consistently have full sixty minute efforts night in, night out. To not give up that first goal even when you’re outplaying the other team. To avoid the tendency of “playing down to the competition”. Maybe that next step is digging deep when you don’t have your best stuff and finding a way to grind out a win in a game that you would’ve lost in the past.
That’s why this matters. The team is trying to establish winning habits and a winning culture, which ultimately leads to winning games. Stringing together a bunch of wins can build a huge cushion in the standings. Look no further than the first half of the 2022-23 season when the Devils won 13 games in a row. I wouldn’t say that the Devils coasted over the second half of that season, but when you bank that many points early, you put yourself in a position where your playoff spot is a mere formality and the day-to-day pressures of navigating the regular season don’t really apply the rest of the way. At that point, the attention shifts to fine-tuning what you have while you prepare for what you hope is a deep playoff run.
I don’t doubt that there still will be challenges to come for this group. Injuries have been a thing in the early portion of the season and this isn’t the EA NHL video game where you can turn injuries off. There will be setbacks. There will be nights where they do indeed not have their legs or they underestimate the competition. There will even be nights where they’re outplayed and flat out get beat.
That said, the Devils put the “they can’t win four in a row” narrative to bed. They put the “Sheldon Keefe can’t beat his old team” narrative to bed after going 0-3 against Toronto one season ago. The next step for this team will be continuing to take care of business now that they’ve banked some points. To not take their foot off the gas once they’re in a position where their playoff spot is a lock. Up next is Minnesota tonight, another quality opponent that should be in the mix for a playoff spot out West. And following that is your classic ‘trap game’ in San Jose and the Devils have made a habit out of losing to bad Sharks teams at home the last few years. Part of that maturation process includes not taking either opponent lightly. If you get beat, you get beat. Don’t beat yourselves.
So far through six games, the Devils aren’t beating themselves. They’re beating the opposition (sans Carolina in the season opener) and they’re doing so in a convincing manner.