From Dogs To Dawgs? At Least For One Night

There’s a big difference between a dog or doggin’ it, and the dawgs that the Devils need. To put it in the simplest of terms, New Jersey has a bunch of dogs and teams like Colorado or Florida have dawgs.  This dog house had been lacking dawgs for quite some time, but has Monday’s game against Minnesota released these dogs into the wild where they could be dawgs once again? I wouldn’t go that far, but it was nice to see. 

It was a scoresheet full of players lambasted with vitriol as of late. Bratt, Palat, Mercer, and of course Doggie Hamilton showed just what this Devils team could be if they ever decided to contribute. Even the up and down Jacob Markstrom played well enough to weather the early Wild onsluaght in the first period. It was nice to see, but don’t take too much out of it as some early puck luck is what held the Devils in this early. A few bounces the other way and this is a much different story. Needless to say, every dog/dawg has its day…

Devils Need To Build Off Of This

Can the Devils build from this? They haven’t given us much to believe they can. They’ll be back home tonight for the Kraken, where Jacob Markstrom gets his second straight start. Seattle is 7-1-2 in their last 10 and in third place in the Pacific. Then it’s two days off until its back at the Rock the Devils face their kryptonite in the Carolina Hurricanes. The Devils must get at least 3/4 points in these two games if they’re going to be taken seriously going forward. It’s projected that 97 points will be needed to get a Wild Card berth in the East this season. The Devils have 36 games left and just 48 points. This leaves 72 points available, of which they’ll need roughly 50 to secure a playoff spot. Im no rocket surgeon, no brain scientist, and I’m probably better at doing meth than math(not trying to find out, but pretty certain I’m closer to Jesse Pinkman than Albert Einstein) but according to my calculations, the Devils need 70% of their remaining points. Every 5 games they need to find a minimum of 7 points. Sure seems like a tall task.

Simon Nemec will draw back in the lineup tonight for Jonathan Kovacevic. The Devils calim to be “managing Kovacevic’s return.” Or is it more like managing Hamilton’s departure?

For the first time in nearly four months, GM Tommy ‘Fumbles’ Fitzgerald emerged from his cave. Looking very uncomfortable, as the heated seats must’ve been turned all the way up, Fitz spoke with media on Wednesday morning. 

A few quick notes from that:

Claims that Keefe is safe and they are “in lock step” togetherPromised the extension to Markstrom upon trading for him. Claims Markstrom “has to be better”When asked about personnel/injury problems, he kept emphasizing “Next man up”…it could be next GM up soon if nothing happens hereEmphasized “belief in the core”Playoffs are “still the goal”…mehAdmitted where the organization is at right now “is on (him)”Gritsyuk extension is a priorityMost notably and asked two times about it, claims that clearing space for potential Quinn was not an issue…so what was the issue? Not sure anyone asked that directly.