While the clear answer to the Devils’ ills was Dougie Hamilton, losing him was just another step in this team becoming slower and less threatening.
When Dougie Hamilton went down with his torn pectoral injury in November of 2023, the New Jersey Devils were pretty quick to announce that he was out long-term due to the required surgery. Simon Nemec filled in admirably for many of Dougie’s minutes, but there’s only so much a team can do with two top defensemen that are 19 and 20 years old. Today, I wanted to look at what was wrong with the Devils’ attack in 2024 (hint: a lot of it has to do with the back end) and how it needs to improve to make the most of the skill-sets that are featured in the top six.
Without Dougie Hamilton and Damon Severson, There Was No Stretch Pass and Less Stability on the Blue Line
Dougie Hamilton was not the only big, righty defenseman the Devils lost this season. From the very start, they were without longtime-Devil Damon Severson, who was maligned for his defensive skills but lauded for some of his playmaking over the years. If you want to see a great breakdown of how the Devils worsened — mostly from the back end and in the neutral zone — check this article out by Corey Sznajder of All Three Zones. The Devils’ cycle game collapsed as well as point shots from the defense, which mostly came from Severson and Hamilton. Without these sources of offense, the blueline was easier for opponents to break past. With such a weak neutral zone structure and a subsequent massive increase in chances against, the Devils were constantly behind the eight ball. As it happens, players like Brendan Smith, John Marino, and Colin Miller struggled the most when it came to sustaining offensive zone possession. However, Miller produced more shots off the rush than Smith and Marino, meaning that the team lost a significant source of rush production at the deadline, further weakening the attack.
Where I think the loss of Severson and Hamilton really hurt the team, though, was in stretching the neutral zone so the forwards could sneak behind the opposing defense. By comparison, Luke Hughes and Simon Nemec have not really developed that pass in their arsenal. Luke makes most of his plays with his skating, while Nemec is a more proficient in-zone offensive player. While Luke and Nemec could develop this pass over the years — they just need to improve their neutral zone reads, and they are certainly talented enough to do so. In the future, they should be as quick to transition as Dougie Hamilton is now, as you can see in the team’s neutral zone transition impact chart above. In the meantime, though, there is a certain concern I have for Luke.
A Perceived Lack of Chemistry Between Certain Players
When Lindy Ruff and Andrew Brunette had the offense clicking in 2022-23, the Devils could create a chance from anywhere on the ice, coming off of anyone’s stick. This season, however, it looked more like certain players only trusted specific linemates enough to give them the puck. This mostly played out with the Hughes brothers, who would end up seeking each other out — especially in the neutral zone — in their efforts to create offensive opportunities. The problem that developed over 82 games was that opponents had an easy time seeing what was coming in these situations. It’s a lot easier for teams to clamp down the middle of the ice so Jack Hughes can’t skate right through them, and blocking the Hughes-to-Hughes connection quickly follows. Compare this to last season, when Jack could get behind the center ice red line and enter the offensive zone perfectly and fluidly with a stretch pass from the back end, and the movement up the ice becomes a lot less efficient and a lot more frustrating to watch.
Trouble With the Breakout
Something that Sznajder’s data found that reflects the confusing inefficiency of the Devils’ defense is their huge increase in defensive zone puck touches, as well as defensive retrievals per 60. On the other hand, they had a massive increase in failed exits per 60 in addition to a worsened success rate on exits. So, the Devils’ defense had plenty of chances to keep the puck out of the defensive zone, but their imprecise, slow puck movement continually doomed goalies to facing down tough shots and chances off turnovers as a part of much more difficult cycle sequences by opponents.
The Result: A Lack of North-South Focus
Without the threat of the stretch pass and a difficulty with everything — from making simple passes to clearing the puck out of the defensive zone — the Devils’ attack was usually doomed before it started. You would hope that, if a defenseman was particularly weak with the puck in the defensive zone, that they would be proficient at keeping the offensive zone. However, this did not seem to be the case for the Devils’ group. Jared asked, recently, if Jonas Siegenthaler and John Marino can be saved. While Siegenthaler had the worse season, in my opinion, Marino’s inability to move the puck in addition to his lack of offensive ability in terms of just holding the zone and keeping the cycle going deeply concerns me. Marino needs to develop one or the other in his game to make enough of a contribution to this team to avoid getting moved in favor of a different veteran or Seamus Casey, who is rising through the ranks.
As it stands, the Devils require a lot of skating through opponents to create offense. Even if they made the playoffs, how far could they have gotten with that as their usual method of operation? Some guys, like Jesper Bratt, the Hughes brothers, Nico Hischier, and Timo Meier can make plays with their legs, but those plays become much more effective if a guy like Simon Nemec could occasionally catch a defender sleeping with a long pass through a hole in the neutral zone coverage. At the very least, having that skill backs the opponent defense off enough for the forwards to have room to skate in the neutral zone.
What we cannot have next year is a team that relies too much on skating and horizontally-oriented passing in the neutral zone. Maybe John Marino needs to practice hitting a stretch target day in and day out. Maybe Jonas Siegenthaler and Kevin Bahl need to practice hitting the glass with the puck if that’s going to be their best play with it. A lot of this inefficiency with offensive zone time has to do with issues in the defensive zone. If this is going to be a quick-strike offense, those strikes need to come quickly, or else the Devils’ dwindling rush chances will continually be swept away on the rebound by backchecking opponents. By relying too much on skating, the Devils allowed their opponents to stay in the play too often, whereas our offensive defensemen from 2022-23 took so much attention off the forwards and did not allow opponents to always stay in front of the play as they did this season. If Nemec and Hughes start thinking bigger with the puck in the neutral zone next year with a healthy Dougie Hamilton, I have hopes that this issue will be left behind them in this awful, awful year.
Your Thoughts
What do you think about these issues? Do you think that people underestimated the impact of Damon Severson on the team? Do you think that Luke and Nemec will be more able to pick other teams apart with their passing next season? Leave your thoughts in the comments below, and thanks for reading. Credit to All Three Zones and HockeyViz for analytical references.