It’s going to be a while before the Devils get some help on the back end. In his post-deadline press conference (video link), GM Tom Fitzgerald indicated that blueliner Jonas Siegenthaler (lower body) won’t be able to return for the rest of the regular season but does have a chance to return in the playoffs. Meanwhile, he declined to put a timeline on the reported week-to-week lower-body injury for Dougie Hamilton but confirmed that his top-scoring blueliner will be out for an extended period.
Siegenthaler has been out of the lineup for a little more than a month due to a lower-body injury and was moved to LTIR in recent days before Jack Hughes’ season-ending shoulder surgery. The 27-year-old isn’t a big point producer from the back end as he had just two goals and seven assists in 55 games before being injured; his nine points matched his total from last season.
But Siegenthaler has long been a capable defensive defender and his absence will be more felt on that end. He primarily played in a shutdown role while taking a regular turn on the penalty kill; all told, he finishes his regular season with 19:36 in ATOI. While that ranks fifth among New Jersey defenders, none of their rearguards are averaging 21 minutes a game on the season with their distribution being quite close, a rarity across the NHL.
New Jersey quickly moved to fill Siegenthaler’s role earlier this week when they acquired Brian Dumoulin from Anaheim while they picked up Dennis Cholowski from the Islanders today to add more defensive depth. But that’s all the help they’re going to have now for a while with no word on how long Hamilton will be out for while we now know that Siegenthaler’s set to miss the final six weeks of the regular season and potentially more.
the hits just keep on coming