SUMMARY OF AVAILABLE PRE-MATCH MEDIA
NEWARK, New Jersey. , The Devils did not hold a morning skate due to the early timing of the faceoff. Head coach Sheldon Keefe met with the media a few hours before the game. Here are the key takeaways…
Change of range
Judging by Friday’s training lines, it appears center Juho Lammikko will return to the squad, with forward Paul Cotter the odd man out.
Keefe explained his reasoning and what he wants to see from his fourth line of Lammikko, Luke Glendening and Stefan Noesen.
“I think what you want from this line is to take care of the play, take care of the momentum of the game or create positive momentum when the team needs it,” Keefe said, “energy, speed on the puck, speed on the forecheck, great defense when it’s time to defend. You want this line to attack and be physical and give life and energy, and then you want it to passes the match in the right place, which means you can keep the momentum going for the next line.”
Keefe said too often the fourth line let the next group cross the boards in a tough defensive situation.
“That’s what I haven’t liked lately is just the way they’ve been able to connect their pass to the next one,” he said, “meaning the next line that goes over the boards, the puck is going to the other team’s net, or the puck is in the other team’s court, ideally.
“Far too often they have a good shift, but it ends with the puck going towards our net, and the next line that comes in is working its way outwards, and that’s not what you want. So it’s less about producing offense for us or anything like that. It’s more about producing positive momentum for the team, you can just go line after line. So when we have one or two good shifts and we play that line and it ends in a hole, it takes a toll on the team.”
Keefe confirmed goaltender Jacob Markstrom would start in goal. Markstrom stopped 32 of 33 shots against in a 2-1 win over Utah on Dec. 19.
A smarter game
The Devils took the aforementioned 2-1 win in Utah, but it wasn’t the prettiest. The club was dominated for long periods and relied on Markstrom to steal this game. Keefe wants to see a better performance today, especially against a club that is loaded with offensive talent.
“We were outplayed pretty well in this game. We need to have the puck a lot more,” he said. “They’re a team that has tremendous skill throughout their group. You saw they scored seven (goals) in Long Island before coming here, and they have that ability, and they probably could have had seven on another day. The goaltending was great. The guys played hard to get time back on our end and that kind of thing, but we need to spend more time on their half of the ice and make it harder for their players to get through the neutral zone.”
View from the other side
Utah head coach Andre Tourigny talked about the difficulty of defending Jack Hughes: “You have to skate with him. You have to make sure you don’t take bad angles on him. He’s really elusive, he’s really shifty, so the work away from the puck before he gets the puck is really important to make sure we have good angles, and we can skate with him, skate on his ice and reduce his time and space as much as possible. If you give him time and space, he’s so skilled and such a good skater, it’s hard to get close to him.
