It tells you all you probably need to hear, when there is little, if any, physicality to the Devils play. No body finished a check this evening as far as I recall.
The Devils fighters this season (and I don’t think I’ve missed any - although I could be wrong) have been Brandt, Cox and Martin. Louis and Batch are either being kept on a very tight leash (for reasons I cannot begin to understand) or they simply don’t have the backs of their colleagues (which I simply wouldn’t choose to want to believe).
Brandt at least tried forechecking this evening, but got injured and after that there wasn’t a Devils forecheck.
Other problems include the state of the ice (CORRECTION) Slush, it is awful. How the Devils Managthink they can use their team’s assets, fast and skilful skaters on slush ice like they have, shows how little they understand about optimising any advantage you have of playing at home.
Fortress IAW, don’t make me laugh. It’s going to be a very mediocre season this year - there needs to be some changes and soon.
Some players are ‘stealing a wage’ when one sees the effort level they put in. (Playing for the name on the back on the jersey not the badge on the front). These are players that have proven previously that they can play at a very high level.
Ordinarily, when you have so many thing go wrong, one would usually go back to basics, but when you don’t know what your starting lines look like, it’s going to be more of an uphill struggle than it should be.