Photo via @Canes on Twitter/X
By Spencer Knight – @stormsurge_pod / stormsurgepod.com
October 11, 2024
To paraphrase Kevin Malone, “why make easy play when fancy play do trick?” The answer is the fancy play often doesn’t do the trick. A season-opening 4-1 loss to the Tampa Bay Lightning could primarily be described as “too fancy.”
Often, the fancy plays come in lieu of the hard working plays. Those were not there tonight either. Post game, Rod Brind’Amour said “They shut us down, didn’t give us a lot of room and we weren’t willing to work hard enough to get our opportunities.”
The Good
After weathering the storm for the first half of the first period, the Canes “identity line” of Martinook, Staal, and Carrier was able to find the back of the net, in a play that could be described as “the epitome of Hurricanes hockey.” A strong forecheck by Jordan Martinook lead to a steal by William Carrier who circled the net and found Jordan Staal across the crease for a tap in goal. While this would be the end of the scoring tonight for the Canes, it certainly wasn’t the end of their offensive opportunities.
As the first period continued, the Canes were driving play, and that continued into the second period. After an early PPG by the Lightning, the Hurricanes had a couple offensive flurries that would have likely beat a lesser goalie. Unfortunately, the Canes were facing Andrei Vasilievskiy tonight.
Besides the few flurries of opportunities, faceoffs are another area of the game where the Canes had the upper hand. 53% of the faceoffs tonight were won by the Canes, primarily by Staal and Kotkaniemi, who won 10 each. Jack Drury, however, had the best win rate of the evening, winning 8 of the 11 draws he took, or over 72%.
Though you can’t tell from the 4-1 final score, Freddie Andersen had a good night in net. He made 19 saves on 21 shots against, good for a .905 SV% and 2.06 GAA. Per Natural Stat Trick, he made 0.31 saves above expected. The 2 goals against were both on powerplays, the first of which he nearly pushed over the net and second off a Kucherov one-timer.
The Bad
This team tonight looked like they either needed an extra week of training camp or they should have started the season earlier in the week. Passes weren’t crisp, positioning was off, and the compete level just wasn’t there. Jordan Staal captured the essence of the game speaking to reporters after the game:
The whole game wasn’t great. You can look at special teams, but even our five-on-five play was pretty gross, really. A lot of turnovers and trying to mosey on through the neutral zone when nothing is there. We really weren’t ready to embrace the grind and go muck it up.
The powerplays looked especially bad tonight, as the Canes spent nearly 6 minutes tonight on the man advantage with just a single shot on goal to show for it. Additionally, they had just 4 total shot attempts while on the powerplay. To put that in perspective, their shot attempts per minute on the powerplay of 0.68 was less than their average across the entire game of 1.02. Their offensive potency decreased while on the powerplay!
The penalty kill was also nothing to write home about. Tampa had 5 more seconds of powerplay time than the Canes, but also more than double the shot attempts. Of their 9 shots attempted, just 1 was blocked and 2 missed the net for 6 powerplay shots on goal, 2 of which went in the net. The league’s best penalty kill from last season certainly needs some work before Tuesday.
Looking Ahead
Saturday Night’s game in Tampa has been postponed due to impacts from Hurricane Helene. The league will announce the make up date at a future time. After an off day Saturday, the Canes will return to practice on Sunday.
On Tuesday the 15th, the Canes will welcome Brett Pesce, Stefan Noesen, and the New Jersey Devils to town. The Devils have already played 3 games this season and sit atop the Metro division (for now) with a 2-1 record and 4 points. They will face the Capitals in DC on Saturday before heading home to face the Utah Hockey Club on Monday. Tuesday’s game will be their 6th of the season, while being just the 2nd for the Hurricanes.
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