Devils Head Coach Critical of Young Defense Pair

NEWARK—Coming out of the 4 Nations Face-Off break, the New Jersey Devils are looking to flip the script on their middling performance since Christmas. In their first test against the Dallas Stars on Saturday, the Devils fell o in regulation, and the head coach was critical of the young defense pair of Luke Hughes and Simon Nemec.

After forking over an early 2-0 lead, the deficit proved to be too much to overcome, despite Jack Hughes scoring twice late to try and will the Devils to at least overtime.

Herculean Jack Hughes Effort Can’t Buoy Devils Past Stars

Some defensive lapses saw the pair of Luke Hughes and Simon Nemec eventually split up. Specifically on the Stars’ first goal, Nemec was caught out of position in the offensive zone, leaving Evgenii Dadonov alone at the top of Jake Allen’s crease to deposit an easy rebound and open the scoring.

The pair of Hughes and Nemec got a few more shifts together before head coach Sheldon Keefe moved Hughes next to Brett Pesce and limited Nemec’s minutes.

Asked about what he thought of Hughes and Nemec so far in their small sample size dating back to before the 4 Nations Face-Off.

“Yeah, not very good,” Keefe responded after the Devils’ 4-2 loss.

Keefe kept it short and sweet. He’s typically pretty articulate when addressing the Devils group as a whole. However, he has yet to put a player on the spot as a result of their individual play.

However, seeing as Luke Hughes skated in 22:46 last night, was deployed on the special teams, and received minutes late in the game, one can deduce it’s Nemec—who received under 13 minutes of ice time—Keefe’s not pleased with.

Jonas Siegenthaler, who was placed on long-term injured reserve, won’t be back anytime soon. And replacing him was never going to be seamless.

However, the Devils expect more poise from their former second overall selection. He has yet to replicate the stature he displayed in his rookie season.

The 21-year-old defenseman explained to New Jersey Hockey Now that his confidence was shaken to start the 2024-25 season as a result of injury. Yet, he believes himself to be full of confidence as of today.

“Yeah, I was dealing with my confidence, too,” Nemec told NJHN. “It’s hard to get the confidence in the NHL if you’re hurt, and then you’re not playing, obviously, the big minutes, on the power play, and all that stuff.”

Nemec isn’t the only promising blueliner on recall with the Devils, however. General manager Tom Fitzgerald and Keefe have kept Seamus Casey around. It seems his presence could have Nemec looking over his shoulder, perhaps as a motivator to improve his performance.

And if Nemec doesn’t, Casey could certainly step into Nemec’s role after showing plenty of promise to begin the 2024-25 season.

Overall, the Devils actually liked the way they played against the Stars and feel they can build off the performance. But it was the few mistakes that proved to be costly, one glaring blunder from Nemec.

We’ll see if Keefe perhaps makes a hasty decision to swap Nemec for Casey out of the 4 Nations break.

The Devils and Nashville Predators drop the puck at 6 P.M. eastern.