Screen Shots: Neck Guards, Nicklas Backstrom, New Jersey Devils

This is Screen Shots, a regular THN.com feature. Here, we take a few different hockey topics into consideration and analyze them in a few paragraphs. Let’s get to it:

Cheers to everyone actively working to implement neck guards at all levels of hockey immediately, the NHL included. 

The tragic passing of Adam Johnson in the United Kingdom signals the urgent need to be as proactive as possible in mitigating the odds of a deep, life-changing injury. That means making neck guards mandatory. 

This is where NHL Players Association executive director Marty Walsh has the chance to provide care and concern about the chances of a similar incident taking place to one of his constituents. We can wait for a handful of weeks, however long it takes, until neck guards have been mass-produced to meet the need. But this isn’t something that can wait. It needs addressing right away.

It’s hard to imagine this issue being something players want to push back on. As the game has gotten faster, collisions leading to spectacular body movements can put players in terrible physical harm. And really, just as players learned to play with visors at hockey’s top level, and just as they once learned to adjust after helmets were made mandatory, so too would they adjust to wearing neck protection. 

We can't stop every terrible situation from happening, and players understand they bear some risk on the ice. But we can work right away to ensure we've done the utmost to guard against terrible outcomes. 

Leagues like the WHL and EIHA should be commended for doing the right thing and mandating neck guards as of this week, or as soon as is practically possible. This happens too often, and the sport’s smartest people are stating the plain facts about making neck guards an essential part of players’ apparel. It’s high time the NHL, NHLPA and every hockey governing body did the same, and we got something done to help assure friends and family of players have less to worry about when their loved one takes to the ice.

It was sad this week when Washington Capitals star Nicklas Backstrom announced he was stepping away from competition indefinitely due to injury problems with his hip. At 35 years old, Backstrom is hardly at his peak as he’s attempting to return to his previously excellent form, and as the game gets quicker, veterans with lots of mileage on them (due mostly to long and costly playoff runs) like Backstrom are finding it challenging to just jump back in the race when they’re not comfortable as the elite competitor they once were.

When you’ve won at the top level of the game as Backstrom has, you know when you’re putting up your best fight and when you’re missing something you once had. Here’s hoping Backstrom can evade Father Time for one more run because, in part, the Caps need all the help they can get. But mostly because you like to see athletes go out in a manner they’d want to go out in. Very few of them get that luxury, and many more are like Backstrom. 

Clashing repeatedly in a physical game has repercussions, and though we wish all NHLers had 20-year careers, the punishment many, if not most, players are cumulatively taking assures shorter careers. Backstrom isn’t the first NHLer to deal with this type of injury, and he definitely won’t be the last.

Finally, the New Jersey Devils got a post-Halloween scare when superstar center Jack Hughes went hard into the end boards and quickly left the game in the first period with an upper-body injury in a 4-1 Devils loss to St. Louis Friday. 

Hughes has been the NHL’s top point-getter with 20 points in 10 games – and with New Jersey already missing captain Nico HIschier, winger Tomas Nosek and defenseman Colin Miller, Hughes being sidelined is a major blow.

That said, one of the reasons people made the Devils one of the pre-season Stanley Cup favorites this season was their overall depth. It’s hard not to feel the ripple effect that comes with having two of your top forwards on the sidelines, but New Jersey has above-average players in Timo Meier, Tyler Toffoli, Jesper Bratt and Ondrej Palat. Their defense corps also can produce offense; three Devils D-men – Dougie Hamilton, John Marino and Luke Hughes – have at least six points in 10 games.

All things considered, New Jersey has enough talent still in the lineup to win games more often than not. Hughes has been as dangerous as any NHLer this season, and losing him definitely stings. But depth is so important precisely because situations like this are frequent in the modern game, and the Devils shouldn’t experience a sag in standings point production simply because of the players they’re missing – rather, their other top talent should be stepping up and producing at a moment like this.