The New Jersey Devils are starting to look like the 2015-16 Edmonton Oilers and that is not a good thing. There are numerous parallels between the two teams: the young superstar (Connor McDavid and Jack Hughes), the very good other number one overall pick (Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Nico Hischier), but poor goaltending.
Yes, the Devils have other young emerging players as well including Jesper Bratt, Dawson Mercer, and others in the pipeline such as Alexander Holtz and Luke Hughes, but at some point, all of this youth needs to learn how to win hockey games. When your best goaltender statistically has appeared in 7 games and has a 2.80 GAA and .909 SV%, it is difficult to rack up points no matter how much offense the team can produce.
Since drafting McDavid in 2015, Edmonton has made the playoffs just three times and have failed to advance past the second round. Though Hughes is just 20 years old and recently signed a long-term contract extension, it would be such a shame to waste a generational talent because of failures in net. If you look at the rival New York Rangers for example, their skating talent is only marginally better than the Devils in all likelihood, but the emergence of Igor Shesterkin at goaltender has propelled the Rangers to a 34-15-5 record that has them in sixth place in the Eastern Conference.
The Devils have created a goaltending pipeline over the last several years that has produced Mackenzie Blackwood, Akira Schmid, and Nico Daws, but with a disappointing season from the aforementioned Canadian, New Jersey is still waiting to see who their long-term answer will be. Whether the Devils believe in the development of one of the three existing options or look outside the organization for a stop-gap answer remains to be seen, but one way or another, the position must see improvement as soon as possible if New Jersey wants to bear the fruit of their young skaters’ talent.
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