On Dumoulin fitting in, Hughes reaching another level, and Haula heating up

Dumoulin has fit like a glove with Kovacevic. Plus, notes on Hughes' offensive form and Haula playing his best hockey.

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A few New Jersey Devils notes on this off-day following a game we don’t need or want to talk about:

Dumoulin fitting like a glove 🧤

I had reservations about parting with any valuable futures to improve this year’s squad when the ceiling looks to be severely capped without Jack Hughes.

The Devils didn’t want to give up on the season, though, and felt adding Dumoulin to the mix could fill a hole on defense and allow the team to at least be competitive come playoff time.

You can still debate whether pulling the trigger was the right decision – taking a probabilistic view, the Devils are unlikely to win even one round – but it’s easy to see the line of thinking.

If not anything else, the Devils identified a good defense target to use the 2nd round pick (and prospect) on.

Although Dumoulin does not provide much offense, and is not perfect defensively, he is generally sound and has replaced a chunk of what was lost when Jonas Siegenthaler went down.

Dumoulin has fared well on the 2nd pairing with Johnathan Kovacevic, helping the Devils control the run of play while limiting what they give up in their zone.

Dumoulin-Kovacevic is not Siegenthaler-Kovacevic (the latter owned a 57% xG share compared to 53% for the former) but they are still effective, especially defensively.

They’ve held opponents to 2.14 expected goals per 60 minutes of 5v5 play, which ranks them 31st out of the 138 pairings to log 230+ minutes together.

With Dumoulin and Kovacevic meshing as well as hoped, and a Dougie Hamilton return imminent, the Devils will be able to ice one of the better six-man defense cores in the playoffs.

Hughes kicking into high gear ⚙️