The birds are chirping, my snow is melting, the glow from the Olympics is wearing off and it’s back to the Devils playoff push. (taps ear: I’m getting some information here… Oh.. oh no.. my producer is telling me we are one of the worst teams in the league). They needed to go roughly 20-5 to make the playoffs coming out of the Olympics. Well, you can’t go 20-5 without going 4-4 first, amirite?
Mid-Olympics I wrote what I feel is the most glaring change that needs to be made: a complete front office
overhaul. While I feel that is a non-negotiable, I have also seen a lot of people call for Keefe’s head, and I am inclined to agree, mostly just to get the full stench of this operation off the team. I don’t see them making any changes until the off-season; if they did nothing after getting blown out 9-0 by the Islanders, I don’t see any what would be embarrassing enough to trigger a change at this point. Keefe looks defeated, sounds defeated, and sounds like he has no answers. I haven’t liked his body language, and his general vibe inspires little confidence right now. And speaking of that 9-0 loss, if I was Marky’s teammate I would’ve been furious he was left in for that whole game and had to wear all 9 goals. From he outside looking in, it seems like he has lost the room.
I truly believe Keefe is a good coach, he had an immaculate track record coming in and I was fully on board with his hiring. He has won everywhere he’s gone, and directed some of the best offensive teams in the NHL in Toronto. I think some of the systems are a bit square peg/round hole and neither of his summer or Olympic break homework assignment yielded any noticeable changes. That being said, I also think there is something to the chatter that Fitz directed him to play a more grinding “playoff style” mainly because it fits my anti-Fitz #agenda and I put this team’s issues on personnel and Fitz more than Keefe. One thing that cannot happen is for Keefe to get scapegoated while Fitz sticks around – I’d probably join a monastery or take up woodworking if that happened instead of the Devils.
Philosophy and Systems
Speaking of that grinding style, let’s get into that. Systems and philosophy are intertwined since philosophy dictates systems. As mentioned above, I do think Fitz laid out the play style he wanted and Keefe fit because his systems matched that philosophy. Remember when Fitz said he was texting with Keefe “just talking about hockey” before the hire? Well, here we are. Before the seasons began, Gerard wrote about Keefe’s “Fight the Panic” systems, which has choked the life out of the offense of this team. I wrote about how this has led to the Devils consistency getting mired in their own zone and eliminates one of the best assets their personnel has: speed.
Systems are the structure – breakout formations, neutral zone regroup formations, face-off roles and responsibilities, and forecheck structure. The jobs within these systems are defined by F1, F2, F3 and D1, D2 roles. Offensive zone play is largely predicated on reading and reacting, filling lanes, timing and finding soft ice within a general structure. Defensive zone play is built with similar ideals: filling lanes, timing, eliminating soft ice, and layering coverage to eliminate dangerous chances. Most teams have similar systems, with a few rare exceptions like Lindy Ruff’s D-Zone Flood, and Rod Brind’Amour’s man-on-man.
One of the reasons why I think there is a systems mismatch is what we use is designed to favor O-zone cycling up high. Hockey has evolved quickly, and this low-to-high/point shot system is already outdated and most modern, 2026 systems, call for slot line and “royal road” chances that make the goalies move. Further, we have minimal personnel down low to create traffic in the offensive zone and our defensive and neutral zone systems don’t lend themselves to creating rush offense and exploiting team speed which should be where this team excels.
I took some pages from Jack Han’s playbook, who worked directly on Keefe’s staff in Toronto. If you’re a coach, or just a dork like me, it’s a lot of fun to see how teams approach the game.
You can really see this high zone system represented in their 5v5 offensive numbers. Below, the green numbers and bars are their totals per 60 in 2025-26, and the right and red line is their league rank in those categories. They are top 10 in shots, but are 16th in scoring chances. Then, when you parse out the scoring chances you will see they rely on mostly low danger chances, where they rank 5th in LDCF and 27th in HDCF. According to Moneypuck, we are still dead last in rebound goals with 3 all season. THREE! This is a system that is too perimeter, and lives too high in the zone:
Further, this is a defense-first system designed to retreat, as evidenced by what happens once there is a need to retrieve/track the puck post-turnover. Since we have mastered the craft of shooting high and wide, you see this retreat a lot:
Once a turnover happens, their system requires forwards to track back into coverage as opposed to pressuring to get the puck back. This is why you see so many “one-and-done” offensive chances. This is one of my biggest gripes with Keefe’s systems, is we were told we would be “pressuring the puck all over the ice” but instead the first instinct is to fall into a defensive posture.
This then brings us to the neutral zone, where once again we play prevent, as opposed to applying pressure.
You will see this in action mostly on line changes and tracking back on pucks. Since two forwards are already high in the Ozone, they are also already in a defensive posture in the neutral zone. Meanwhile, the F1 is looping to put “pressure” on the opposing D as they try to move the puck up. Philosophically, this should work. Force the play, cause a turnover, turn the puck back up ice. But the tracking never seems to work and we give up the blue line far too easily.
We also don’t turn the puck up ice quickly enough if we do cause a turnover. You see this so often as our D will delay in the high D-zone waiting for the forwards to complete their regroup routes. This is literally ingrained in our D-zone breakouts and neutral zone regroups and part fo the overarching philosophy:
There are those words, “Fight The Panic.” I do like this as well, in theory, passing to the weak side D as a release valve to create open ice is smart. It releases pressure, and should give us a clean lane. However, we simply do not move the puck quickly enough, and our most of our D is not equipped to make tape-to-tape passes consistently and only Luke really has the ability to use his legs. This often leads to either a missed pass that turns the puck back, or a forced puck/turnover at the point because the D wait too long.
Power Play
A lot of attention has been on Keefe, but a guy that has flown mostly under the radar is Jeremy Colliton (or has he?). I will admit that special teams can be tricky, but what was an elite unit last season that carried us, has turned into mediocre group. Some of that is personnel driven with Jack’s injuries and Noesen turning back into a pumpkin, but we have enough talent to adjust and adapt. I have just seen very little adapting. No structural changes, particularly on zone entries. Aside from dropping from the 3rd ranked unit to the 15th ranked unit they are generating 1.0 less xG/60 and actually scoring 3.5 actual goal less/60. Simply stated this year the PP is less effective at generating chances, and like everything ‘round these parts are struggling to finish.
I’d also note that the fall off of this unit has impacted production for Bratt and Nico. Or have down seasons from Nico and Bratt affected the success of the Power Play? Last season 51% of Bratt’s assists came on the PP (34 of 67) , this season he is pacing at 43% (13 of 30). Similarly 40% of Nico’s goals last season (14 of 35) came on the PP and this season he is tracking at 30% (6 of 20).
I wouldn’t blink twice if they brought in someone new here not named Mark Recchi (Mark Savard is available who ran Toronto’s PP until the middle of the season).
PK/ Defense
The other primary assistant, Brad Shaw should also be examined, although I think his issues are mainly personnel based. The PK has fallen from 2nd to 16th, although this is largely from an awfull stretch during Pesce’s absence in the fall where they were converting around ~50ish percent. At 5v5 they have more or less treaded water from last season going from 9th in the league with 2.38 xGA/60 at 5v5 to 16th with 2.67 xGA/60. What bothered me this season about the PK is the need to field “specialists” like Glendening who did next to nothing otherwise. Glass has filled in there without missing a beat and generally being a good PKer is about communication, good stick position, and hustle.
His D-zone coverage is relatively standard, a hybrid zone with handoffs, and some man coverage when dictated. Mostly I think breakdowns here are execution and personnel based, which is generally true of any similar system:
Goaltending
Bye Dave.
So, Now What?
I usually have some options and/or suggestions for replacements, but the in season the list is limited. However, I did have some interim thoughts and long term thoughts for both now and the off-season.
If you truly want to see this team get burned to the ground, one never-gonna-happen-but-fun-to-think-about option would be to bring in John Torterella for the last chunk of the season ONLY. He is not a long term option, but he has a unique ability not sniff out the passengers and dead weight and we desperately need that. Combined with Lou through the draft to clean this mess up would be absolute cinema. Put cameras everywhere and film it, then hand off to Sunny Mehta and a new coach.
Back in the real world the best unemployed option is old pal Pete DeBoer. He would be a longer term solution, and after being relieved of his duties in Dallas, he would be a perfect middle ground between Ruff’s run-and-gun and Keefe’s fight the panic. He led Vegas and Dallas to 6 straight WCF, three 1st place division finishes, two 2nd place division finishes and only had one sub – .600 winning pct season during those last 6 seasons. He did hit a wall in WCFs for variety of reasons, but I’d take that over whatever this nonsense we are witnessing.
There is also newly fired Jim Hiller, which is gonna be a no from me, Dog. You think this current sludge puck is bad, he would somehow make it worse.
This highlights the problem with in-season coaching moves – you have to pick from the unemployment line for the most part or look at interim/internal solutions. Similar to the GM position, finding an up and coming coach is my preference long term from either the college ranks or assistant coach ranks. Both Spencer Carberry and Dan Muse came from these types of roles, as did Ryan Warsofsky in SJ. Carbery and Warsofsky also both came through the SC Stingrays of the ECHL who have become a feeder program for high level coaches in the league. Jared Bednar also came through the organization and current Flames assistant Cail MacLean was also a head coach there.
There are also few guys in the college ranks that I think would be interesting to discuss the opening with. One name that was hot two years ago was David Carle of the University of Denver, but another I think should really get a hard look is Rand Pecknold of Qunnipiac. Very few people in college hockey have done more with less than Pecknold. He also is a great recruiter, finding a very handsome young undersized defenseman from NJ and giving him a chance when said very good-looking blogger was overlooked. Or, continuing the theme of old Devils buddies, would Jay Pandolfo want to take a crack at an NHL gig or is he entrenched too deeply at BU?
If you want to get even crazier, you could poach someone from the Junior/Youth Ranks, like Scott Gomez who is quickly rising the coaching ranks and currently leads the premiere USHL program the Chicago Steel, or Joe van further outside the box like Montreal did with Martin St. Louis and look at old buddy Travis Zajac who coaches up the road for the NJ Colonials 12U AAA team.
Your Thoughts
Is firing Keefe and/or staff like firing a chef because the restaurant owner bought month old fish at retail prices because the owner doesn’t know he’s running a Steakhouse? Have the players quiet quit on him? If nothing happens in-season, is moving on from him and staff this offseason the right move, or does he deserve another season? Do Colliton and Shaw deserve another go?Any up-and-coming coaches you have your eye on? Let me know in the comments!
LGD
