NEWARK, New Jersey – After a hot start to the new NHL season with three wins in their first three games, the Utah Hockey Club returned to earth with a shutout loss to the New Jersey Devils. With a plethora of penalties and an inability to settle in offensively, Utah ended their east coast road trip with the first loss of the season.
Here are the key takeaways from Utah’s first-ever loss.
While it wasn’t a perfect start for Karel Vejmelka as the team surrendered three goals, it was still an impressive performance by Utah’s backup goaltender in his season debut.
Facing 33 shots, Vejmelka stopped 30 pucks against the Devils on Monday afternoon. With that type of a barrage, there’s really not much more you can ask a goaltender to do, especially when two of the goals came on penalty kills.
For the majority of the game, Vejmelka was quick to react, aware of the puck, had great positioning and even came up with a few big saves early in the game.
Huge kick save from Vejmelka off a big rebound with a ton of traffic in front of the net. Great reaction to keep the puck out.
— Cole Bagley (@BagleyKSLsports) October 14, 2024
For his efforts, Vejmelka was regarded as Utah’s best player by defenseman Mikhail Sergachev.
“He was phenomenal. He was really good, our best player today by far,” Sergachev said.
Vejmelka has been excellent on this PK. Moved well, tracked the puck, and anticipated all the shots before they happened.
Great individual performance.
— Cole Bagley (@BagleyKSLsports) October 14, 2024
With a 3-0 loss, it would be easy to blame it on the goaltender but that was not the case against the Devils. Penalties and poor play by the rest of the team put Vejmelka in some tight spots but overall, he was solid in his debut.
While penalties have already been an issue for the Utah Hockey Club to start the season, they finally cost the club in a big way in New Jersey.
Penalties stacking up against Utah today.
Too many men on the ice.
Today, they’re paying for it.
— Cole Bagley (@BagleyKSLsports) October 14, 2024
Against the Devils, Utah sat in the penalty box for 14 minutes. They also surrendered two power-play goals and with three penalties in the second period they hindered themselves from creating any momentum.
“Those guys on the other side are well coached,” Coach André Tourigny said. “They were ready for us. They knew what kind of a threat we are offensively…we got in the box in the second period, lost our rhythm, and from there we chased the game.”
It’s one thing to take accidental penalties, but most of their infractions against New Jersey were just poor decisions. Ian Cole took an interference penalty after he was beaten to the puck, Lawson Crouse committed an unnecessary roughing penalty in the corner and Utah also sat in the box after having too many men on the ice.
Overall, it was just a lack of composure by Utah but that’s bound to happen occasionally. It was the third game of a long east coast road trip, and they already exhausted a lot of energy with wins against the Islanders and Rangers. It doesn’t completely excuse the lack of composure, but it provides a bit of understanding of why it may be happening.
Luckily, most of these are issues can be corrected. It just takes a little more awareness and composure to not commit lazy penalties.
Utah has 12 shots on goal and 10 penalty minutes…not going to win very many games that way.
Need to be more composed in the third if they want a chance to get back into this game.
— Cole Bagley (@BagleyKSLsports) October 14, 2024
After scoring 16 goals in their first three games of the season, production dried up against New Jersey and Utah struggled to create shots let alone goals on Monday afternoon.
Most of the credit can honestly be given to New Jersey for how they played against Utah. For the majority of the game, the Devils were the more physical team, played with a higher level of energy, went after Utah’s playmakers, were perfect on the penalty kill and shut Utah out.
Before their matchup with the Devils, Utah boasted one of the hottest offenses in the NHL led by the Dylan Guenther (NHL-best five goals), Logan Cooley (NHL-best five assists) and Clayton Keller (tied for most points with six). On Monday, New Jersey made an emphasis to deny these players any chances and appeared to be extra physical with them.
Dylan Guenther: “Getting inside is a big one [takeaway]. I thought the first two games we did a good job and against New York we got away from it but we still had success. Sometimes you want to be a little too cute but just dumbing it down and looking to create.”#UtahHC
— Cole Bagley (@BagleyKSLsports) October 14, 2024
“Getting inside is a big one [takeaway]. I thought the first two games we did a good job and against New York we got away from it, but we still had success. Sometimes you want to be a little too cute but just dumbing it down and looking to create,” Dylan Guenther said.
Cooley especially was singled out by New Jersey as they sent him to the ice multiple times and refused to allow him to create. If you shut Cooley down, then you shut down Utah’s entire second line.
For the Devils, that worked perfectly as they didn’t allow Utah to score a single goal.
“Our first three games I talked a lot about how much we went inside and how much we got those rebounds, tips, and in tight. If you don’t get those, you don’t get the next one, you don’t get the seam play and you have the tape to prove it,” Coach Tourigny said.
Like coach Tourigny said, Utah was simply unable to play their game against New Jersey. The inside opportunities faded away, they failed to get traffic to the net and the chances they like the most were non-existent.
As they transition to Anaheim, they’ll need to reestablish their offensive game to get back on track and back into the win column.
The Utah Hockey Club will wrap up their initial road trip against the Anaheim Ducks on Wednesday. The game can be viewed on SEG+. Fans can also tune in on air on the KSL Sports APP or on 97.5 and 1280 The Zone. Click here for the full schedule.
