New Jersey Devils fire head coach Lindy Ruff

Devils assistant, and former Canucks bench boss, Travis Green will take over down the stretch.

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The New Jersey Devils have finally made a change behind the bench, relieving head coach Lindy Ruff of his duties and replacing him with Travis Green in the interim.

This comes after a dreadful 2-5 stretch in which the Devils’ lone wins came against two of the league’s worst teams in the Sharks and Canadiens.

Mixed in were some of the ugliest losses you could possibly drum up at a time every game matters so much.

The Devils were blown out by a Capitals team they’re competing with for a playoff spot, they completely no-showed against their biggest rivals, they generated only 19 shots on goal against a Lightning team they’re chasing for the Wild Card, they lost to a horrendous Ducks side playing in a back-to-back situation, and capped off their road trip with a rather lifeless performance against a Kings team missing key personnel like Adrian Kempe and Viktor Arvidsson.

It is no secret GM Tom Fitzgerald is a fan of Lindy Ruff and did not wish to go this route. There is no better evidence of that than electing to keep Ruff on board after a disastrous showing against the Bolts in which the fans were calling for his head.

Fitzgerald instead opted to be patient, giving Ruff another few games to try and quiet things down out West. Ruff wasn’t able to get the team back on track and here we are.

Although I thought the decision to extend Ruff was perfectly defensible at the time, even as someone who didn’t like the hire Day 1, moving on from him now is a complete no brainer. Quite frankly, it should have been done some time ago.

New Jersey’s problems stem far beyond easy (yet valid) excuses like poor goaltending and injuries; and Ruff simply hasn’t been able to find any solutions.