The Devils played two of their best games of the season this weekend. In between them, co-owner Josh Harris helicoptered into Newark and, in a move that led to a universal “wait, what?” from the hockey world, fired his general manager.

It was a decision that begged for an explanation. The Devils finally look like they are finding some semblance of an identity. Yes, the season overall is a disaster, and after raising expectations with a splashy offseason, Ray Shero owns that.

Still: Why now? Why let Shero trade a former MVP and fire a head coach if, a few weeks later, you’re just going to hand him a pink slip, too? Why pull the trigger just weeks from a pivotal trading deadline when the team can continued to amass much-needed assets?

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Did Harris, the billionaire investor, look at his empire of distressed companies and have an awakening after 45 games?

“Wait a minute. I own a hockey team?! I need to cut back on the cognac.”

Sadly, those answers were not forthcoming. Harris fielded questions for 10 minutes but offered no specifics about his decision, leaving everyone -- paying customers included -- wondering about the direction of this once-proud franchise.

“We’re just not getting it done,” he told reporters at the Prudential Center on Sunday. "We haven’t been winning. And so this is, there wasn’t anything specific. You guys know the record. You guys know everything that’s been done. There were a lot of positives, but it was time to go in a different direction.”

It was a master class in owner-speak, but five of those words -- “you guys know the record” -- apply to more than just Shero. We know the record of Harris and co-owner David Blitzer since they purchased the team in 2013, and to be clear, it isn’t pretty.

This is a fair time to wonder if the men who bailed out the Devils from the financial hardships six-and-a-half years ago have a clue. Maybe it’s long past time, actually. The franchise they took over, the one with three Stanley Cups to show for the past quarter century, has exactly one playoff victory to show for their uninspired tenure and little hope of more on the horizon.

Say what you want about Shero, but at least he had a plan. He was the league’s most celebrated executive this offseason when he made his bold moves for defenseman PK Subban and sniper Nikita Gusev. To say the team underachieved out of the gates is an understatement, and those struggles cost head coach John Hynes his job.

All, however, was not lost. This is a young team with several good building blocks that still has room under the salary cap to make more improvements this summer. This is hardly the kind of train wreck that requires a dramatic midseason move -- the bookend wins over Washington and Tampa Bay, two contenders, is proof of that.

So what gives? It seems difficult to believe that something didn’t happen in the past few weeks, some disagreement on personnel or philosophy, for Harris to make this announcement barely an hour before a home game. If that’s the case, then Harris owed his fanbase an explanation given his own past declarations about the GM’s job performance.

Nine months ago, it was Harris declaring that he felt “incredibly optimistic about the future” after extending Shero’s contract. Clearly, back then, he had to have bought into Shero’s vision for the offseason -- and was practically giddy during the team’s over-the-top introductory event for Subban after the trade that landed the former Norris Trophy-winning defenseman.

But, then again, maybe his quick about face shouldn’t really be a surprise. Harris and Blitzer also pledged to get out of the way of longtime GM Lou Lamoriello when they bought the team in 2013 -- “I hope he’s here for another 26 years," Blitzer gushed -- but a year and a half later, they grabbed control of hockey operations and gave them to Shero.

Lamoriello is thriving with the Islanders. The Devils, meanwhile, now have an interim GM to go along with an interim head coach with no timetable for making a permanent decision. Harris, a billionaire known for taking over distressed companies, better have a plan for this distressed hockey team. Right now, it is hard to see anything resembling one.

“We don’t do these things lightly,” Harris said. “We take a long-term approach. But the reality is, we’re now in our fifth season (with Shero) and we’ve made the playoffs once. And it was just time for a change.”

And so, the Devils move ahead with the well-respected Tom Fitzgerald as acting GM and Devils great Martin Brodeur sliding into an advisor role. Fitzgerald will face the same decision as Shero, and that’s whether to buy into the team’s recent surge or be a seller at the deadline.

The latter still makes sense, and it’s hard not to wonder if that’s what led to Shero’s dismissal. Maybe he told Harris something he didn’t want to hear about jettisoning veteran players. Either way, the Devils look like a rudderless joke, and that’s on the owners.

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Steve Politi may be reached at spoliti@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @StevePoliti. Find NJ.com on Facebook.