In what has been a season to forget for the New Jersey Devils, it is surprisingly difficult to identify the biggest problem spot. Certainly the losses of Scott Niedermayer to free agency and Scott Stevens to retirement did serious damage to the team’s blue line, and free-agent replacements Dan McGillis and Vladimir Malakhov have proven to be poor substitutes. But in looking at the Devils’ problems this season, it is clear they go beyond the tattered defense.

Up front, the team only has three players who have scored 10 or more goals thus far, and only Brian Gionta (21 goals) is in the NHL’s top 50. As things stand right now, only Scott Gomez (14 goals), Alexander Mogilny (12 goals), and Sergei Brylin (9 goals) are good bets to join Gionta in the 20-goal club. And of course, the team’s inability to put the puck in the net puts even more pressure on the struggling defense, which only makes All-Star goaltender Martin Brodeur’s job that much more difficult.

Thankfully for the Devils, there is some good news on the horizon: Patrik Elias is due to return to the lineup very soon, and should provide the team with a much-needed offensive boost. Elias has missed all 39 games this season while recovering from a violent bout of Hepatitis A he contracted while playing in Russia during the lockout. Hospitalized for a month, Elias lost 30 pounds and has only just recently returned to game shape.

There has been some speculation that Elias might return to the lineup as early as tonight to play the Florida Panthers, but GM and interim head coach Lou Lamoriello might want the talented forward to participate in a few more practices first. If Lamoriello chooses the more conservative route, look for Elias to make his season debut on Friday, January 13, against the Vancouver Canucks.

Though it would be completely unfair for the Devils to place their 2006 playoff hopes squarely on Elias’s shoulders, his presence in the lineup – particularly on the power play – should be a huge improvement over players like Thomas Pihlman, Barry Tallackson, and Cam Janssen, all of whom have dressed in Elias’s spot at various points in the season, and have combined to score just four points in 30 games.

It’s not possible to overstate Elias’s importance to the Devils’ offense; since the turn of the century, he has been the team’s primary scoring threat. He was the team’s points-scoring leader in each season from 1999-2000 through 2003-04, and led the Devils in goals in every season but 2000-01 (when Alexander Mogilny’s 43 bested him by three). Equally important when playing in the Devils’ defense-first system, Elias is a complete two-way player. In 558 career NHL games, he has compiled a very impressive +140 rating.

The new NHL rules would appear to be tailor-made for Elias’s game, and it’s a good bet that as he regains his form he will re-emerge as one of the league’s best players. More important, he will make the Devils around him better as well. In 2003-04, Scott Gomez played some of the best hockey of his career as he centered Elias and Gionta on what was the league’s best line in the season’s second half.

Though he is one of the NHL’s best playmakers when he sets his mind to it, Gomez’s career has been littered with lengthy slumps. The first one came when Mogilny signed with the Toronto Maple Leafs following the 2000-01 season. Gomez’s production subsequently fell from an adequate 63 points to an abysmal 48 points despite playing in the same number of games (76) both seasons.

Gomez rebounded slightly in 2002-03, scoring 55 points in 82 games; however, with only 12 points in 24 playoff games, he was not a key protagonist in the Devils’ 2003 Stanley Cup victory.It wasn’t until he was placed on a line with Elias midway through the 2003-04 season that Gomez finally regained his stride, scoring 70 points and re-emerging as a bona fide top-line center.

Unfortunately, with Elias out of the lineup, Gomez was unable to regain his dazzling chemistry with Mogilny, and so the two players have both struggled on separate lines. Gomez has played considerably better in recent weeks, and it likely has something to do with Elias’s imminent arrival.

Elias’s return should also be a boon for Mogilny, though they likely won’t play on the same line. Mogilny has struggled badly this season, due mostly to a combination of injuries and the simple fact that, at age 36, he cannot possibly be expected to carry the Devils’ offense. He is currently riding an ugly six-game goalless streak, in which he has recorded but one assist. It’s a solid bet that Mogilny will be a prime beneficiary as teams start to dedicate their finest checkers to covering Elias, and if the Devils are to steal an Eastern Conference playoff spot this spring,they’ll need a strong contribution from Mogilny.

And finally, there’s Brian Rafalski. The Devils’ power play quarterback has been a tremendous disappointment this year, doing precious little to justify Lamoriello’s $8.4 million commitment to him for this season and next.While it would be both unreasonable and unfair to blame Lamoriello for Niedermayer’s departure – the former Norris Trophy winner chose to sign with the Ducks for less money so that he could play with his brother Rob – it is absolutely fair to levy tremendous blame on Rafalski for his abysmal performance.

With only three goals in 39 games – and a -5 rating – Rafalski is proving to be anything but the anchor the Devils defense desperately needs, particularly on the power play. And given his enormous salary, Lamoriello had a right to expect much, much more. It will be interesting to see whether Elias’s arrival galvanizes Rafalski. If it doesn’t, look for Lamoriello to make Rafalski available in a trade. With the salary cap expected to rise next season, a Cup contender might consider Rafalski to be the missing piece – a right-shooting power play quarterback – in their quest for hockey’s holy grail.

Given the litany of struggles the Devils have faced this season, it is more than a bit unreasonable to expect Elias to save the team upon his return. Given what he has gone through during the past year, simply regaining his form at some point this season and starting the 2006-07 campaign at full strength would constitute a successful return.

However, there is good reason to hope for more. Adding Elias to their goal-starved lineup might just prove to be the tipping point the Devils need to get themselves back on track. The 2005 calendar year was clearly one to forget for the Devils … will Elias’s return get 2006 off to a better start?

Mr. Greenstein is the editor in chief of InsideHockey.com.