In recent times, Devils fans have entered many seasons hoping for breakout years from their first-round selections. The unfortunate truth is that only those drafted first overall, Nico Hischier and Jack Hughes, have truly met expectations.
Over the past decade or so, New Jersey has seen first-rounders like Pavel Zacha, Alexander Holtz, Adam Larsson, Stefan Matteau, Chase Stillman, and Ty Smith experience underwhelming and even non-existent levels of NHL success. Outside of those #1 picks, you’d have to go all the way back to the 2004 draft, where Travis Zajac was taken at 20th overall, to find the last opening-round selection to make a lasting impact in New Jersey. However, there is a defenseman with the Devils who is ready to break that narrative.
While I wanted to say Anton Silayev, the 6’7” Russian is not ready for this type of impact just yet. It’s the more obvious pick for a breakout season, and that is Luke Hughes. The youngest and biggest of the Hughes brothers, whom unreasonable fans love to hate, has it all. Most notable is his elite skating ability. Not since Scott Niedermayer have the Devils had a defender who can cut through the neutral zone with the puck like Luke. The soon-to-be 23-year-old ranks in the 97th percentile of all NHL skaters in terms of both top speed and speed burst volume.
The offensive numbers have been very good for the young D-man, despite getting limited time on PP1—a spot that the once seemingly jettisoned Dougie Hamilton is likely to retain. As a matter of fact, in his first two seasons, NO NHL DEFENDER—I REPEAT, NONE, NOT ONE defenseman in the entire league—had more 5v4 power-play points per 60 minutes than Luke! In addition, while quarterbacking the man advantage, New Jersey generated 119.41 shot attempts and 67.01 shots on goal per 60 minutes. Among all defenders with over 100 minutes of power-play time, those metrics ranked him 2nd and 1st in the entire National Hockey League, respectively.
With that said, the anxiety-riddled, never-happy, "you suck til' you win a cup" crowd will be quick to rush to the comments and tell us how #43 is an overrated, "nepo brother" who only gets ice time because of his last name.
Which brings us to his last name: Hughes. From whom better to expect progress than the little brother of two NHL elite talents, who themselves come back vastly improved every season?
While the bright signs of growth are extremely evident, there were a few moments defensively where Luke did struggle and perhaps even regress. The good news is that defensive positioning and technique are completely teachable, whereas insane speed and skill with the puck cannot be learned.
The other good news (yes, there’s more good news!) is that there are reasons to exonerate him for nearly all of the lapses in the D-zone last season. Firstly, Luke was coming off of shoulder surgery and missed almost all of his postseason training. Secondly, Luke missed almost all of camp as former GM Tom Fitzgerald couldn’t find a way to finalize his new contract in time. Third, and most notably, Brett Pesce, Luke’s veteran and the crutch of a D-partner, missed most of the season, leaving the duo that was so effective the year prior to play only 20 games as a pair. His replacements were Simon Nemec, who lacks nearly all defensive fundamentals, and Jonathan Kovacevic, who was also on the mend from offseason surgery himself.
Next was the Devils' goaltending. The tandem of Jacob Markstrom and Jake Allen rarely made the saves to cover for errors by defensemen, especially Markstrom, who was one of the league's worst with a -11.9 GSA last season. Finally, there was the fragile locker room that was unable to navigate the waters of "When’s Quinn coming? When’s help coming? When’s Jack coming back?" This chatter around the team caused the entire roster to flounder, further magnifying any and all defensive miscues. Excuses, excuses, excuses—but am I wrong?
To reference Luke’s biggest comparison in Devils history yet again, Scott Niedermayer was not exactly a defensive stalwart in his first few years. Luckily for him, he had partners such as Slava Fetisov and Ken Daneyko to cover most of his blemishes. Guess what? If they couldn't help, Jacob Markstrom surely wasn’t between the pipes.
Learning to defend at the NHL level takes time, and at just 23 years old when the season starts, Luke still has plenty. Expect Luke to come out of the gate flying and solidify himself as the elite-skating, space-making, chance-generating, and point-scoring D-man that we all hoped he could be on draft day in 2021.