Back From Hiatus

I would like to apologize to any possible readers I might actually have that might possibly, but probably don't, care about this blog.  So like, to the .0000000000000000001% of the universe that is actually reading this, I'm sorry for disappearing for a month or however long it was.  S#%* happens, ya know?  Well, anyways, I'm back now (for however long that lasts), and I guess we have a lot to cover.

Number one: Apparently the Devils decided they were gonna turn into the freakin' Mets, or something, and have half their line-up fall victim to the injury bug.  And it's not the sucky part of the line-up, either; we're talking the Hall of Fame goalie, first line left wing part of the line-up.  Since my fingers might fall off from typing every single injury the Devils have sustained this season, I'll just cover the two most important ones.  Martin Brodeur and Zach Parise.  Brodeur will probably be back within the next week, but Parise will be out until around February.  I may or may not have cried when I found out.

Well, the next game after it was discovered that the Devils would be without arguably their best all-around player for three months was against the Blackhawks in Chicago.  Yes, I did make a ton of extremely retarded "Win one for the Zipper" jokes before the game started.  But I guess John MacLean actually did play the part of Knute Rockne because the Devils pulled off the upset against the defending Stanley Cup champs.  However, they lost the next two games at the Rock before Ilya Kovalchuk blasted the game-winner in overtime against Edmonton to give the team its first home win of the season.

The team then went on the road and was shut out in Boston and only managed one goal against the struggling Maple Leafs in a loss in Toronto.  On November 19th, three-time Jack Adams Award winner and coach of the 2003 Stanley Cup-winning New Jersey Devils Pat Burns passed away and the entire hockey world minus the biggest idiots alive the Hall of Fame committee agreed that he should have been inducted into the Hall just two weeks prior to his death.  Because they won't tell you this but it's written in the contracts of those on the committee that they must never ever ever ever do something that makes obvious sense, even a little bit.  In case you were wondering, that's written right underneath the "No Accountability" clause.

The following night, the Devils gave a great effort in St. Louis and Mattias Tedenby pretty much baptised himself as "Swedish Zach Parise" but a couple of bad bounces later and another two points was snatched away from them.  Which leads us to this week, and this week was actually pretty stunning.

This year is different than other years; the Devils aren't fighting for the Division title, they're fighting for their entire season.  They've dug themselves into quite a hole.  It's not even a hole, at this point; they buried themselves in an avalanche of volcanic ash.  But this week, some light became visible through all the dirt clouds.  They destroyed the Capitals, 5-0, at home on November 22nd.  They squeaked out a 2-1 shootout win against the Flames on November 24th. 

Which brings us to Thanksgiving.  I hope all you Yankees out there had a great holiday.  And I'd just like to point out how thankful I am for Chris Botta's (AOL FanHouse) words on Zach Parise in this Puck Daddy Thanksgiving Day post.  A bunch of different bloggers were asked what they were thankful for in hockey, and one of Botta's reponses was this:

Zach Parise's will to score: Oh, how he is missed this season -- not just by the New Jersey Devils, but anyone who cares about the right way to play the game.

So thank you, Chris Botta, because I don't think anybody has ever said anything as simply true as that about Zach Parise.

The Devils took a big step back and a kick in the pants when they were blanked by the Islanders on Long Island, who had previously lost 14 games in a row, yesterday afternoon.  (Personally, I don't know what everyone's talking about, saying that the Devils gave a terrible effort.  That's the best damn effort I've seen all season to try and grab the number one pick next June.) 

But where these cellar-dwelling, bottom-feeding New Jersey Devils of 2010-2011 would have just continued to drag their feet, or struggle at best, for at least another game, this week's Devils showed up for the Flyers today as a totally different team.  Travis Zajac sniped the shootout winner and the roof pretty much blew off my house; I swear you would have thought they won the Cup or something, my brothers were yelling that loud.  Yes, the Flyers outshot them 41-25 but the Devils gave an admirable effort and they played very well defensively.  They anticipated the fact that the Flyers would be on the attack and that they would not have the puck very often, so they played smart without the puck and managed to get some pretty good scoring chances anyway.

There have been flaws these last few games; you'd be crazy if you couldn't see that.  But it could be worse; they could be some crap team that didn't win two games in a row until the week of Thanksgiving. ...Oh.  That's right.  Well, forget that, then.  Because for at least this past week, the Devils are starting to look like a team that might be able to drag itself out of the rubble, pick up all the pieces, and put their season back together.  For the Zipper.  For Burnsie.  Maybe.  Possibly. Hopefully.  I mean, I can dream, right?