Daniel Amoia
Too many recent seasons of underperformance from the New Jersey Devils has led to widespread debate: How much is the core to blame?
Regardless of your opinion, it’s undeniable that a lack of depth scoring, inconsistent defense and shoddy goaltending has all played a role in the Devils’ recent failures. To pin it all on the core would be disingenuous.
Among that core, Swiss Devils Nico Hischier and Timo Meier are immensely important. Let’s grade and discuss their 2025-26 performance.
Nico Hischier: B
With so much discussion regarding a potential extension, widespread debate has transpired on Hischier’s true value. AFP Analytics is projecting Hischier to sign an eight-year, $11.45M AAV contract.
On one hand, Hischier had his worst offensive season (66 points) since the shortened 2021 COVID year. On the other, he still scored 28 goals, remained healthy all season, and held his own despite Keefe asking a lot of him.
Per Natural Stat Trick, there’s reason to believe that Hischier will bounce back offensively. At 5v5, he generated 0.77 expected goals per 60 minutes (ixG/60), which isn’t really different at all from the season prior (0.79 ixG/60).
The glaring difference is, like most Devils, he struggled to finish at 5v5. It was a season-to-season drop-off of over 43% in the goal scoring department, yet he still potted 28.
All in all, Hischier scored 4.16 goals below expected and likely missed out on a chunk of points due to his teammates’ finishing woes, too. A 32-goal, 75+ point season would’ve changed the narrative. Still, he provided his usual defensive value and became just the third center to reach 1,000 faceoff wins since 2019-20, joining Sidney Crosby & Patrice Bergeron.
A player like Hischier is immensely difficult to replace. Remember: if he were to leave the organization at some point, the Devils would still have to adequately replace him. That seems near impossible.
Timo Meier: B-
Many observers see Meier’s counting stats since joining the Devils and immediately label his tenure a disappointment.
After scoring 66 goals in his final two seasons (0.493 G/GP — 134 games) with the San Jose Sharks, he’s scored just 87 in 247 (0.352 G/GP) with the Devils — a ~29% decrease. But let’s dig a little deeper.
In those final 134 games for San Jose, Meier scored 25 power play goals (0.187 PPG/GP). In New Jersey, he’s scored just two more — 27 goals — despite 113 more games played (0.109 PPG/GP). That’s a ~42% drop-off.
Why is this the case? In San Jose, Meier was “the guy” on the man advantage, similar to Jack Hughes on the Devils. This led to 2:47 of ice time per game (TOI/GP), almost exclusively on the top unit.
In the last two seasons, his power play TOI/GP has been just 1:56 — most of it on the second unit. That utilization alone costs Meier approximately ~6-7 goals per season. But that doesn’t mean the Devils are wrong to use him that way. Historically, the power play has performed much better when Hughes and Meier are deployed on separate units.
That’s the first reason for Meier’s drop-off in scoring. The second is lessened even strength goal production — a ~20% decrease from San Jose. However, that seems to be once again attributed to not being “the guy”, as there’s no question that Jack is “that guy” in New Jersey.
With Jack in the lineup, Meier scores 0.325 G/GP. Without Jack, he scores 0.46 G/GP — a ~42% increase. It’s a lesser version of the same logic that pertains to a player like Nick Suzuki, who is well over a point-per-game talent, notching just two points in six games at the Olympics. Teammates can overshadow him.
Timo Meier.#NJDevils pic.twitter.com/05TSoZ9sgR
— Daniel Amoia (@daniel_amoia) January 3, 2026
Regardless, Meier certainly needs to finish more. He posted an 8.9% shooting percentage in 2025–26, the lowest of his career in any non-COVID-shortened season. If he just finished around his career norms, he would’ve scored roughly 33 goals rather than 24.
But given the rising cap and his physical ability (~141 hits per season as a Devil), Meier still holds tremendous value with his $8.8M AAV contract. He gets far more hate than he deserves.
Obviously, the only things that matter are actual goals. But at even strength, these are the only players who generated more ‘expected goals’ than Meier: Brady Tkachuk, Auston Matthews, Brandon Hagel, Matthew Tkachuk, Zach Hyman and Anders Lee.
The process and effort for Meier is there; if the Devils have Jack healthy all season, which is a great “problem” to have, a realistic benchmark for Meier should be 30 goals, not 40.
