With all-star weekend (finally) coming to a close and the latter half of the season about to begin, I thought it'd be fun to look back at the best and worst aspects of the New Jersey Devils' year to date.
BEST
- Taylor Hall. The Devils' lone all-star representative leads the team in goals per game, assists per game, points per game and shots per game. Hall is also at or near the top of the team in generating scoring chances, suppressing chances and has brought some excitement on a nightly basis in what has otherwise been a rough season.
- Miles Wood. He really needs to work on his defensive zone play and what he does without the puck, but he makes things happen offensively and his skating is beautiful to watch. If not anything else, he's a very exciting player who makes the games a lot more fun regardless of the end result.
- Damon Severson's production has hit a bit of a wall of late (likely due to no power play time) but he has done a fairly good job of replacing Adam Larsson. Severson is on pace for a respectable 36 points, his 5v5 numbers are solid relative to the team, and he seems to be improving on the defensive side of things. I don't think you could have realistically asked for much more out of him this season.
- Steve Santini has played 13 games thus far and has handled himself well more nights than not. The sample size is small, and he still has a lot of room to grow, but I like what I have seen from him so far. Hopefully he can keep it up because the Devils' defense could certainly use a little more quality.
WORST
- Team defense prior to January. For the first chunk of the season, the Devils were turning the puck over way too much, they couldn't cleanly break out of the zone, they couldn't box anyone out, and they screened their own goaltenders on as many goals as the opposition did.
- Cory Schneider. As mentioned above, the defense was horrific for much of the year and made life a lot more difficult on Schneider than they needed to. Still, given how good he is, and how much money he makes, you'd expect more than a .910 save percentage through 37 games.
- P.A. Parenteau makes $1.25 million and was claimed off waivers just prior to the season. He is tied for the team lead in goals and is averaging more on a per game basis than Adam Henrique, Kyle Palmieri, and Mike Cammalleri despite getting less ice time. Given Henrique and Palmieri are coming off 30 goal campaigns, and Cammalleri is making $5 million, that is not really acceptable.
- The Devils are last in the East in points percentage, goal differential, and only Arizona and Colorado have fewer points on the year. For the Devils to add Hall, Parenteau, etc. in the off-season and take a step back is pretty disappointing.
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