If you are arriving today looking for 2018 NHL Draft coverage for the Carolina Hurricanes, you can find a four-part series primarily covering the opening of offseason trading in the links below.
Part 1: Potential wheeling and dealing
Part 2: Potential targets (Teams A-M)
Part 3: Potential targets (Teams N-Z)
Part 4: Playing General Manager
Today’s Daily Cup of Joe takes a first look at the Carolina Hurricanes 2018-19 schedule which was released on Thursday.
Unique features
A weekday home opener. The home opener which is also the season opener is on Thursday, October 4. The team has generally played the home opener during the weekend. Not counting the lockout season, the team has not played its home opener on a weekday since the 2010-11 season, and even that was an oddity because the Raleigh home opener was not until October 27 after starting the season in Helsinki and then jumping straight into the NC State Fair road trip. It will be interesting to see if the marketing department can muster a full house on a Thursday night.
A State Fair home game. The team will also play at home during the NC State Fair for the first time in forever with a 1pm home game on Saturday October 20. Here is hoping that someone comes up with a solid plan to handle parking.
Afternoon delights. In addition to the 5pm Sunday starts that have become standard, the team has four afternoon games, three with a 1pm start time and another at 2pm.
New Year’s Eve. December 31 makes a reappearance on the schedule with a 6pm home game against the Philadelphia Flyers.
Level of difficulty
The schedule is tough by default in that the Metropolitan Division continues to be the home of the Stanley Cup champion. In addition, the Hurricanes play a whopping 17 sets of back to back games making nearly half of the schedule (34 out of 82 games) back-to-back games.
Key stretches
November home stand. The longest home stand of the season entails six straight at PNC Arena in mid-November. If the team gets off to a decent start in October, that stretch would represent a great opportunity to climb above the playoff cut line early.
A new year away from home. Once the calendar flips to 2019, the Hurricanes face an extended run of mostly road hockey. They play 13 out of 19 games away from home including a season-long five-game road trip in early February to finish it off.
A busy March. The Hurricanes play 16 games in 31 days in March, but maybe more significantly, the team has a back-to-back set in each of the five weekends in March.
What say you Canes fans?
1) In taking a first look at the 2018-19 Carolina Hurricanes schedule, what catches your eye?
2) Which stretches of schedule do you think will be most critical?
Go Canes!
Back-to-backs are certainly apparent, though other teams will face the same challenges. We also have numerous stretches of 3 or 4 days off in between (might benefit rest and additional practice). Not to state the obvious, but this year our backup goalie will likely play a key role and have maybe more opportunities.
I care about one day right now. Today. Happy Svech Day everyone!!!!!!
SVECH ALWAYS READY!!!
Combining 1 and 2.
A. For once we start off the season without a road-heavy schedule. Pretty even home/away for the first couple of months.
B. Jan-Feb – where did the team go? Only 4 home games in January and only 6 home games over 6 weeks into February, including a 20 day stretch with 8 away games and 2 home games. I think that is the critical period.
C. And there is little time to recover before the series of weekend back-to-backs begin in March. That will be punishing.
Overall, I think the schedule is reasonable for the first 3 months – then gets harsh for the remainder of the season.
Much has been said about our goal tending tandem of late. Not much has been positive. Blame for the poor performance of the team has been heaped upon Scotty and Cam.
But is it fair?
I say no.
Bear with me here while I show you some rudimentary stats.
1983-84 season.
GAA. SV%
Grant Fuhr. 3.91. .883
Andy Moog. 3.77. .882
These men played behind a team that never gave a thought to being defensively responsible. Never. Ever.
The team scored 446 goals that year. It was an NHL record. Nobody cared if the goalie let in 6 goals. The team would simply score 8 goals. By the way, Edmonton won the Cup that season.
2005-06 Season
Martin Gerber. 2.78. .906
Cam Ward. 3.68. .882
The Canes scored 286 goals. And they went on to win the Cup that season.
2015-16 Season
Eddie Lack. 2.81. .901
Cam Ward. 2.41. .909
My beloved Canes scored 198 goals that season.
2016-17 Season
Scott Darling. 3.18. .888
Cam Ward. 2.73. .906
My beloved Canes scored 225 goals for.
In each case, the team in front of the goalkeepers left them high and dry too many times. Nobody was defensively responsible.
Yet, in the first two cases, the team scored enough goals to win. In the second two cases, they did not. The blame for the team not being defensively responsible did not fall on the shoulders of one man up front; not Messier nor Skinny. The blame for the enemy scoring against does not lie solely with the keepers.
I think everyone is resting up for tonight. Not sure if we’ll have a draft thread, but my fridge is stocked…I’m treating this like the last hockey ‘hurrah’ before the dog days of summer.
If anyone is sensitive about the No. 2 pick, don’t go to Hockeybuzz. Eklund is pushing the rumor of a massive deal among the Canes, the Wings, the Caps, and the Leafs. Hanifin and our pick to the Wings. They send us their pick, a couple of roster players. I assume that the other teams send us assets that we want and that Detroit doesn’t have.
I don’t usually get too excited at Ecklund’s rumors, but this one makes sense on two levels.
1) it shakes the core and the fans, giving us a lot of assets. Waddell gets to beat his chest and Dundon sells tickets.
2) Detroit needs something big to go along with their shiny new stadium. What could be better than to bring the Svech brothers together? Wow!
I checked same site and they mentioned Hanifin and package from Detroit but nothing regarding 2OA. That said, highly doubt we give up 2OA.
Read the discussions. What else would be in play?
Why would the Canes send Hannifin and 2OA to Detroit? What can Detroit offer up that matches such a deal. I don’t see it.
High scoring teams can make up for lousy goaltending, but the Canes are not a high scoring team and won’t be transformed into one overnight.
The Canes can vastly improve the goal differential and chances of winning either by tweaking a roster of 12 forwards or by upgrading one or two goalies. I think they need to try both.
I’m glad to hear rumors of darling working hard, and I am all for forgetting last season if he shows true grit and determination and adds Carolina to his list of obsticles overcome, but I can’t bet my hopes for the season on it.