NEWARK—In the New Jersey Devils’ locker room one day after they claimed points in six of their last eight games, rattling off five wins in that span, we asked key Devils players, the head coach, and general manager one simple question.
The Devils recently rebounded from a scoreless 40 minutes against the last place Chicago Blackhawks with a rookie goaltender tending their twine, erupting for a four-goal third period to take two points off the table. A common downward trend for the Devils lately has been their performance on home ice and how they start games.
In the locker room, a couple of players were asked, “How are you feeling just over 30 games into the 2024-25 season led to some complex answers in the locker room?”
We also asked head coach Sheldon Keefe and general manager Tom Fitzgerald the same thing.
That simple question led to some insightful answers, with one common theme among each response.
Per usual, Keefe was perhaps the most thorough, but Fitzgerald, Johnathan Kovacevic, and Dougie Hamilton gave us a good chunk to nibble on as well.
In fact, Kovacevic even pinpointed the turning point for the Devils this season when things really began to click. And Hamilton? He can typically be pretty shy with the media. However, the question prompted an enthused response.
Dougie Hamilton
“Good, I think, yeah,” Hamilton responded to New Jersey Hockey Now with enthusiasm.
Hamilton’s enthused response is certainly points to how good the locker room is feeling about themselves right now.
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Certainly, it’s justified as they now sit in first place in the Metropolitan Division, second in terms of points percentage.
The Devils’ No.1 defenseman started the string of responses that was consistent across the board. Evolution, and growth as a team is something each response prompted in one way or another.
“We’ve kind of grown and developed a lot, I think, over the year by changing a lot of things and evolving and whatnot,” Hamilton continued. “And I think we all know we have the pieces in here to be a really, really good team. It’s just about doing it consistently. And obviously that’s hard to do, but we’re trying to do that and every game. Giving yourself a chance to win, I think that’s the biggest thing.”
Johnathan Kovacevic
There’s little doubt that Kovacevic has been the Devils’ biggest surprise this season. He just finished explaining how good he feels on a personal level, taking advantage of an opportunity at the beginning of the year and turning himself into a regular, every day defenseman for the Devils.
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Then, when the same question was pointed at the team’s overall performance, he explained what he believed to be the turning point for the Devils, turning from a good team into a great team.
“I feel pretty good. I think we showed that we can beat some really good teams,” Kovacevic explained to NJHN. “That Florida trip stands out in my mind, taking out the Stanley Cup Champions twice, we beat Carolina, and played some good games against some top teams. So, I feel confident with our team, and now it’s about getting that consistency and bringing that same game every game, and kind of creating our identity. I know we’ve done a good job of that. Like early in the year, we were figuring it out, and I think now we know what makes us really good.”
Including the two wins over the Florida Panthers (twice) and solid rebound after a 4-0 loss to the Tampa Bay Lightning by defeating the Carolina Hurricanes the very next game, the Devils are 11-4-1 since their trip to the Sunshine State. And although winning 11 of 16 games is certainly something any team in the NHL would take, there were blips on the radar along the way.
And you know who is going to point that out 10/10 times.
Sheldon Keefe
The man behind the bench who pushes all the buttons is extremely successful in the NHL. What his players love about his coaching style is his transparency.
Even in the highs, Keefe isn’t blind to the lows. Amid his team’s heavy chunk of wins in the last calendar month, he’s happy to see the Devils work through some of their inconsistencies.
“I’m feeling good right now. I think we’ve seen real good growth from our guys, I was really happy with the home stand,” Keefe said to NJHN. “I think we left some points on the table there, for sure. But when I look at our overall process, we know we needed to fix our starts. We needed to fix our overall play on home ice. So, you know, having a five game home stand, that should have been something for us to be excited about, but it’s a bit daunting at the same time just because of how we played. So it’s like, ‘Okay, let’s make sure we get this right.’ And through good chunks of that, I really liked our game, and I liked how we finished.
“The third period [against Chicago], you know, lots of really good things that showed up there that we’ve been really talking about, offensively, trying to accomplish. That came through. So, we’ve had been a good team on the road. We had to get it right at home. And now, I like where we were at on this home stretch. We got to bring it back to the road.”
The Devils certainly got off on the right foot in the first of their two away games this week. Ondrej Palat opened the scoring against the St. Louis Blues en route to a 4-1 victory in another strong defensive effort, and performance from Jacob Markstrom in goal.
Tom Fitzgerald
Fitzgerald has been consistent in what he sees and wants from the Devils. Scoring has never been an issue for him. That’s evident in their NHL seventh-best 3.35 goals per game.
What Fitzgerald wanted to see was better defensive structure and goaltending. As opposed to last season, he’s certainly seen improvement. The result is strong play in all three zone, which has Fitzgerald feeling good about the team he constructed.
“Pretty good. I think the way we’re playing and how we’re winning games is, we’re winning games the right way by defending first,” Fitzgerald responded to NJHN. “This allows our offense to take care of what needs to be taken care of down at the other end.”
However, Fitzgerald isn’t so different from Keefe. Perhaps, that was one of the reasons on the Devils GMs pro list when contemplating who his next head coach will be over the summer.
After Fitzgerald highlighted his pleasure with the Devils’ growth and current status, he didn’t hesitate to explain he knows some guys on the roster have more to offer.
“I think there are guys that are playing extremely well, and I think there are guys that know they need to find their game and help contribute any way they can. But overall, you can’t complain about being 20 and 10 in this league because it’s so hard every night to win a game.”
The message across the board was aligned. The Devils are feeling good about their evolution as a team as opposed to where they were last season. However, no one is feeling complacent.
And that’s a winning mentality.
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