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The New Jersey Devils 2021-22 Regular Season Thread


mfitz804

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2 hours ago, MB3 said:

One of my earliest hockey memories is Jagr scoring with a minute left and then again in overtime in 1999. That finished up a back-to-back losing to the 8 seed as a 1 seed, right? 

When you hear players talk about what was missing in 97-99 AND what was missing in 2001, they all say it was Pepe. Scott Gomez even went as far to say if the Devils paid him what he wanted instead of letting him go to Phoenix, they "win in 5 games against Colorado." 

I'm not so sure about that mostly because Marty (somewhat quietly and propped up by an excellent hockey team) was very up and down for just about all of the 2000-01 regular season and postseason combined...and he really bottomed out in the SCF.  If you got the playoff Marty of 1995, 2000 or 2003, then I still think there's a chance that the 2001 team stubbornly finds a way to get it done, even without Lemieux...but it's also fair to say that the 2001 team had just kinda bottomed out in general, after being so damned good for much of the year.  They managed only 11 goals for the series (held to one goal or less in four of the seven games).  What's weird is that the Devils entered that SCF on a roll...had won 6 out of 7 and had outscored their opponents 26-10...yeah, Pittsburgh was oddly disinterested for most of that series, but I didn't see the Devils' offense just disappearing the way that it did.

Guess one can wonder if Claude was that needed missing element.  

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1 minute ago, DevsMan84 said:

Yeah I would say the 2001 team lost the cup for 3 main reasons: 1) They got cocky after game 5 2) Marty was not good that entire year and run and 3) Mogilny disappeared after the second round (12 pts in 13 games in Rounds 1&2, 4 points in 12 games in rounds 3&4).

Brodeur wasn’t Brodeur, but still had a 2.07 GAA and 4 shutouts in the playoffs.

We scored two goals in the 4 games that Colorado won in the finals. Not saying Marty was great, he gave up a lot in a couple of those games, but you can’t score 2 goals in 4 games in the finals and think you are going to win. 

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Just now, MB3 said:

You can't make a list without also saying 4. they played the SCF without their best player, Scott Niedermayer. I know Sakic wound up missing some time, too, but that Avelanche team was LOADED up front, and the Devils really were pretty thin at the blueline when their biggest minute eater went down. 

Niedermayer actually came back for rounds 3 & 4 that year (he recorded 2 assists in the finals).  He was only out the rest of the Leafs series.

IIRC Sakic didn't miss any time in their run, but they were without Forsberg for rounds 3 & 4 due to believe either a ruptured appendix or spleen.

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Just now, mfitz804 said:

Brodeur wasn’t Brodeur, but still had a 2.07 GAA and 4 shutouts in the playoffs.

We scored two goals in the 4 games that Colorado won in the finals. Not saying Marty was great, he gave up a lot in a couple of those games, but you can’t score 2 goals in 4 games in the finals and think you are going to win. 

Brodeur had an .870 save % in the SCF that year.  That's terrible.  Roy had an .938 save % and saw 32 more shots over that series.

Not saying our offense sputtering out that series didn't have an effect (that is why I mentioned Mogilny as our secondary scoring dried up), but Brodeur was thoroughly outplayed.

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9 minutes ago, DevsMan84 said:

Brodeur had an .870 save % in the SCF that year.  That's terrible.  Roy had an .938 save % and saw 32 more shots over that series.

Not saying our offense sputtering out that series didn't have an effect (that is why I mentioned Mogilny as our secondary scoring dried up), but Brodeur was thoroughly outplayed.

Oh, no doubt. But he could’ve stood on his head in those 4 games and we likely would have still lost all 4, whether that’s our offense taking a huge dump at center ice, or Roy doing Roy things, or a combination of the two. 

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28 minutes ago, MB3 said:

As Gomer tells it, that 2001 team was a little bit overconfident. Despite the fact that Colorado had a better season, despite the fact that Colorado was heavily favored, the team was like "yea this is ours." He said after the game 5 win, the feeling was "hey, awesome, now we get to win it in front of the fans." Even after the game, he said the feeling was "yea that's annoying that we've gotta travel back to Colorado, but there's no way we're actually gonna lose". He said Pepe was a HUGE voice in the locker room, and underrated in terms of how much he meant to the team during their runs at staying focused -- Stevens was more of a "lead by example" and "lead in practice", but Pep was the guy telling people not to get ahead of themselves. 

One of the interesting things he tells that fans probably don't give enough thought to is -- as he explains it -- the real reason the team lost the Stanley Cup that year... the first round matchup. The Devils were up 3-0 on Carolina and totally took their foot off the gas. Gomez said the feeling in the locker room was "we can beat these guys in our sleep". When they lost game 4 to Carolina in Raleigh, the room was actually laughing and relaxed -- too relaxed -- just saying "ah yea we'll wrap this up in game 5 at home". When they go lose that game, they have to fly back to raleigh, win, fly back to NJ and then face the very rested Maple Leafs. It kind of set the tone for a little bit of a slump going into the final two rounds, and every little bit helps. 

That 2001 team went on that 22-2-0 run where they pretty much WERE unbeatable (includes that 3-0 series lead in against the 'Canes)...and yeah, I agree that it felt like after that Carolina series somehow went 6 games, that they lost their mojo a bit.  The series against the Leafs was a struggle, and then the perfect "tonic" team in the indifferent Pens shows up and offers very little resistance (Devils shut the Pens on the road, back-to-back, Games 3 and 4...imagine being a Pens fan and going to those games?!)...the Devils felt probably felt like "OK, we're good to go now".  And yeah, the WAY that they won Game 5 in the SCF (4-1) probably has them saying that AGAIN..."Hey, we've had some meh games, yet we're STILL up in this series 3-2."  But as we know, the Avs slammed the door hard.  Seven straight goals from Game 6 to Game 7, before the Devils finally scored one.  

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1 hour ago, Colorado Rockies 1976 said:

But as we know, the Avs slammed the door hard.  Seven straight goals from Game 6 to Game 7, before the Devils finally scored one.  

Correction: ROY slammed the door hard. After the Gomez goal to start game 6 that was waved off, dude locked it down. There was nothing getting past him. 

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23 minutes ago, MadDog2020 said:

Correction: ROY slammed the door hard. After the Gomez goal to start game 6 that was waved off, dude locked it down. There was nothing getting past him. 

Oh he did, but the rest of the team gave him plenty of support.  They got it fully together at just the right time.  Without Forsberg no less.

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28 minutes ago, mfitz804 said:

Is there anything more NJDevs than a few pages about the 2001 Stanley Cup Finals in the 2021-22 Regular Season thread? 

Nope

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4 hours ago, DevsMan84 said:

Niedermayer actually came back for rounds 3 & 4 that year (he recorded 2 assists in the finals).  He was only out the rest of the Leafs series.

IIRC Sakic didn't miss any time in their run, but they were without Forsberg for rounds 3 & 4 due to believe either a ruptured appendix or spleen.

We lost McKay in game 1 as well- I think he broke his wrist or something. I’m pretty sure Bob Corkum took his spot. Yeah….. 😞

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7 minutes ago, RunninWithTheDevil said:

This guy works at the liquor store I go to, nicest guy ever honestly, always down to talk Devils hockey when I go in

Nice, I honestly only voted for the guy who didn't get to call a game cause of the power outage cause I felt bad for him. Didn't matter to me who actually won though but nice to hear he's a fan.

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2 minutes ago, Satans Hockey said:

Nice, I honestly only voted for the guy who didn't get to call a game cause of the power outage cause I felt bad for him. Didn't matter to me who actually won though but nice to hear he's a fan.

Yeah major superfan, I didn't even realize it was him until he won so that's awesome. I remember one day I was talking to him about something non-Devils related and he was like "oh yeah I remember that, that was the same week Parise scored a hat trick vs the Caps"

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19 minutes ago, RunninWithTheDevil said:

This guy works at the liquor store I go to, nicest guy ever honestly, always down to talk Devils hockey when I go in

I can’t think of many things I care less about than the PA announcer, but it’s awesome it went to someone who is a real fan. 

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