Lifeless Devils Shut Out by Stars

With each new loss it becomes more and more obvious just how badly the New Jersey Devils miss Jack Hughes.

Take Wednesday night’s game against Western Conference powerhouse Dallas at Prudential Center. The Devils had nothing. At virtually no point during a 3-0 whitewash did they ever give the impression they had a chance of winning. Not once did they give a good-sized midweek crowd of 15,805 anything to cheer about after a pre-game ceremony honoring Brendan Dillon for playing in his 1,000th NHL game.

They threw 30 shots Jake Oettinger’s way, but didn’t make him work too hard for his second shutout of the season.

And if the outcome was ever in doubt after Miro Heiskanen scored at 11 minutes, 34 seconds of the second period to make it 1-0, Jason Robertson’s goal at 17:36 made the third period all but academic.

In the wake of this one there should be some serious doubts as to whether or not the Devils can weather the next month without their franchise center.

They’re now 4-6-0 without Hughes. The last five days have been an absolute disaster. They’ve lost three straight at home where they were once 9-0-1. Against lesser competition in Philadelphia and Columbus they were at least competitive, but against the Dallas Stars? It was ugly.

Dallas is 10-1-4 on the road this year and it’s easy to see why. Coming off a 3-2 overtime loss to the Rangers on Tuesday at Madison Square Garden, the Stars kept everything simple, played smart and patient hockey and waited for the Devils to make a mistake. And when they did, they made sure to make them pay.

Heiskanen’s fourth goal of the year came after Devils goalie Jacob Markstrom and defenseman Jonas Siegenthaler got tangled up in Markstrom’s crease.

Just 6:02 later Jason Robertson scored his 17th goal of the year to make it 2-0 when the Devils’ Dillon-Dennis Cholowski pairing couldn’t handle the Stars’ cycle, and at that point the only issue at hand seemed to be whether or not the Devils would get shut out on home ice for the first time this season.

If the Devils gained any momentum from killing off a late second period tripping penalty by Dougie Hamilton, it evaporated at 7:05 of third when Mikko Rantanen made a nifty little tip to himself for his 12th goal of the year.

Not even a week ago the Devils were sitting atop the Eastern Conference and Metro Division and looking forward to a four-game home stand to pad their lead. Now they’re at fifth in the conference and fourth in the division and looked lifeless and lost against one of the league’s best teams.

Unless they want to give back half the wins from the early season streak that put them near the top of the standings, all in their own building, they’ll need to play much better against the Vegas Golden Knights on Friday.

Up Next

The Devils play Vegas at 7 pm, Friday, at Prudential Center. Vegas is coming off a 4-3 shootout win over the Chicago Blackhawks on Tuesday night. Carter Hart made his Vegas debut Tuesday night. Former Devil Akira Schmid was the backup and is 9-2-1 for the Golden Knights this year with a 2.51 goals against average and .896 save percentage.

Your Thoughts

So what did everyone think? There’s not much good to take away from this one. No one got hurt? They were totally outmatched and clearly are not in the class as Dallas. Not a lot of teams are, but still. … That was not a good loss.