Devils 5, Canadiens 2: The beat goes on

Jack Hughes piled up another four (primary) points, Tyler Toffoli netted a hat trick, and the Devils breezed their way to victory.

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A few thoughts from the New Jersey Devils’ best performance of the young season:

The beat goes on

I might need to get myself a thesaurus because I’m running out of ways to describe Jack Hughes and we’re only five games into the campaign.

In the very early going it felt like he was fighting it a little bit. He bobbled the puck a few times in the offensive zone, he was getting steered to the outside, and not a whole lot was happening. I was thinking to myself ‘ah, here comes the inevitable off night.’

Jack had other ideas.

He continued to get better and better as the game progressed. By the midway point, it felt like the Devils were on the man advantage every time he touched the ice.

He started to dance his way around the neutral zone. He was creating shot after shot for his wingers – Tyler Toffoli and Timo Meier – and it felt like everything he touched was going to end up in the back of the net. I mean, the one play where he picked a puck out the air and almost batted it home? The kid is unreal.

At 5v5 the Devils won the shot attempt battle 22-7 while controlling better than 76% of the expected goal share. Hughes was once again responsible for a ton of the facilitating, attempting six of those shots while assisting on seven. That means he primarily contributed to 60% of the Devils’ shot output he was on for.

The Devils were only able to turn all that offense into one goal – the 5v5 shooting woes continue! – but it didn’t matter because the Devils are suddenly as good as the historically dominant Oilers on the power play.

Hughes picked up a couple primary assists on the man advantage, capitalizing on Montreal’s putrid penalty kill (as expected).

He also made a crafty pass to get the puck to Tyler Toffoli for an empty-netter to complete his hatty.

Add up the numbers across all situations and Hughes had 10 attempts, seven scoring chances, seven shot assists (at 5v5 alone) and four primary assists.

He now has 14 points through five games, all of which are primary. What he is doing is incredibly special. And he’s just getting started.

Hughes had help