Another Trade Deadline gone. After almost a decade of covering The League, you would think the surprise factor would be less and less. But, no. Once more, the hours after The NHL’s annual Trade Frenzy have many feeling quite perplexed. And while plenty of trades were made across The League, we will stick close to home in this article. 

Back in early December, it looked like Friday, March 7, 2025, would be the day the New Jersey Devils would go out and acquire the couple of missing pieces that would transform them from a playoff team to a serious Stanley Cup contender. However, due to the recent season-ending injury sustained by Jack Hughes, Dougie Hamilton currently being listed as “out for an extended period” and Jonas Siegenthaler being declared “out for the remainder of the regular season,” New Jersey’s GM, Tom Fitzgerald did not go “all-in” at The Deadline. Rather, he added some depth to the blue line and the bottom six upfront. But none of those moves were true game-changers. Later Friday night, the Garden Staters played host to the Winnipeg Jets and the result was a 6-1 defeat for the home team. 

Roughly an hour before the game began, Fitzgerald met with the assembled media to discuss his Trade Deadline moves. First, here’s a quick summary of those deals.

• Jonathan Kovacevic, who was slated to be an unrestricted free agent on July 1st, signed a five-year extension carrying an annual cap hit of $4M. 

• Depth defenseman Dennis Cholowski was acquired from the Islanders for AHL forward Adam Beckman. 

• Bottom six forward Cody Glass and AHL forward Jonathan Gruden were brought in from Pittsburgh in exchange for AHL winger Chase Stillman, unsigned draft choice Max Graham and the Devils’ 2027 third round pick. 

• Bottom six forward Daniel Sprong was acquired from Seattle for a 7th round pick in 2026.

• AHL center Marc McLaughlin was brought in from Boston’s system in exchange for AHL defenseman Daniil Misyul.

• Lastly, on Thursday, defenseman Brian Dumoulin was acquired from Anaheim, with 2024 draftee Herman Traff (winger) and a 2025 second round draft choice going the other way.

The biggest of those moves were re-signing Kovacevic, who has been a pleasant surprise since coming to New Jersey during Training Camp and trading for Dumoulin, who eats up lots of minutes and is a steady blue liner. 

Getting Glass and Sprong won’t solve the Devils’ offensive woes, but they will give Head Coach Sheldon Keefe more options for his bottom-six. “It gives us optionality moving forward,” Fitzgerald said. 

Of course, the actual “biggest” move is the one that wasn’t made. Fitzgerald alluded to trying to go big, saying, “You’re in a fight, right to the 12th round and I don’t wanna say we got a knockout punch, but, it was a split decision. The player went to a different team and it was difficult. But that happens. You win some, you lose some. My goal, from the get-go, was to add to this group and the player whom I went after hard was that player, with or without Jack (Hughes) (getting injured). We were still trying to add that and unfortunately we came in second.”

League sources have said one of the “big” players Fitzgerald was after was Mikko Rantanen, who Carolina dealt to Dallas after failing to secure a contract extension with him after acquiring the Finnish winger from Colorado at the end of January. Other sources have indicated that one of the players was Brock Nelson, who the Islanders traded to the Avalanche late Thursday night after failing to come to terms on a contract extension. 

Whether it was one or both of Rantanen and Nelson, or another player entirely, the fact that Fitzgerald was unable to acquire his target is causing Devils’ fans to have a sour taste in their mouths. Of course, you can’t solely blame the Devils’ GM as the seller’s market meant he, as a buyer, was not in an advantageous position. 

“It was a lot of waiting around for answers from teams,” Fitzgerald explained. “With offers out for players, sometimes, when it’s a seller’s market, you’re at the mercy of their phone calls. We had a goal to try to add to our team in certain positions. Tried hard on certain players and some players were traded for big time assets and some re-signed with their teams, especially on the wing. So then, you sit there and just kind of readjust and really kind of look at what we can do to help this team improve. We felt that the bottom six is something where we could try to add some speed, some size and a little more depth.”

Specifically, those bottom-six additions were Daniel Sprong and Cody Glass. As one of the media members pointed out to Fitzgerald, Sprong was available via waivers back in January, so if the Devils were interested in him, why did they wait?

“We talked about it at the time,” New Jersey’s GM said. “But we just felt, we’ve seen him play in the past, actually scoring goals and using his speed; especially when he was in Washington versus us. We thought, ‘you know what?’ This is a low risk, with (possible) high returns.”

As for Glass, Fitzgerald said, “size and speed. Plays wing, center, gives you optionality. We wanna be bigger, we wanna be faster. And he gives us that.”

Those are reasonable explanations and expectations, but the reality is that this Devils team has difficulty scoring goals and two new bottom-six forwards are not going to solve that problem, especially with Jack Hughes done for the year, thus shortening the top-six. 

“That’s our goal (to make the playoffs),” Fitzgerald reiterated. “It’s no different from the start of the year. The difference is we’re missing some players. You can’t fill those shoes. But we still have a good team. You look at our goaltending, you look at defense, how we’ve defended, we’re one of the better teams in The League defending, giving up the least amount of goals. So that’s where it’s gonna start. We’re gonna have to learn how to manufacture goals differently. I really like the way we play. I think our group really understands that, for us to continue to get points, we’ve gotta play a connected game and defense first. Play on top of the other team. Just stay in the fight and try to manufacture goals as differently or often as we possibly can.”

The jury is out on whether or not the Devils will be able to manufacture goals differently and play connected without Jack Hughes in the lineup. Of course, New Jersey’s GM still believes in his squad, even if the on-ice results have been less than flattering of late.

“I believe in them,” Fitzgerald passionately stated. “We’re a good team. Yeah, no Jack Hughes. But we’re not a one man team. No Dougie Hamilton. But we’re not a one man defense corps. We’re a good team and I think our team realizes that when you can play a committed defensive game, you give yourself a chance to win every night.”

After watching his Devils lose to the Jets 6-1 on Friday night, Fitzgerald might be having some second thoughts about his team’s ability to overcome the obstacles in front of it. But a strong leader is a confident one, so maybe there’s still hope. Otherwise, a once promising Devils season is going to go right down the drain.