When 2018 ended, the Carolina Hurricanes were 16-17-5. The team had just wrapped up an abysmal 4-8-1 December and seemed to be racing rapidly for another early playoff contention exit. Then, starting with a win over the Flyers on New Year’s Eve, the Hurricanes seemed to suddenly do a 180. After first, the wins seemed like a bit of a hot streak, but now 10 weeks later it increasingly looks more simply like the Hurricanes are just a good hockey team.
Today’s Daily Cup of Joe offers a quick tour of some numbers since the rebound started.
Road 180
Arguably the single greatest contributor to the turnaround is the team’s ability to turn things around on the road. Heading into January, the Hurricanes struggled to a 6-10-1 road record. Since the start of the new year, the Hurricanes are an astounding 14-3-2 on the road which is even better than the team’s 8-4-0 home record.
El Nino
Since the addition of Nino Niederreiter in mid-January just before the streak started, the Hurricanes are 15-5-2 (119-point pace). Niederreiter has 11 goals and 21 points playing on a top line with Sebastian Aho.
“League average goaltending” …and then some
Petr Mrazek keeps trending up. His record was a solid 4-2-1 in January, and his play was generally good. But his save percentage in January was .880. That increased to .932 in February and sits at .943 through three starts in March.
Not to be outdone, Curtis McElhinney posted only a .879 save percentage in January but followed it up with a scintillating .950 in February. His March numbers are inflated by the 8-1 drubbing by Winnipeg, but he too seems to be trending upward minus the outlier.
Blue line scoring boost
Blue line scoring has also been a positive factor in the turnaround. Dougie Hamilton had three goals through December and now has 10 more since the start of January. Brett Pesce has 14 of his 22 points in the 31 games since January 1. Justin Faulk has six of his eight goals since the start of 2019.
Justin Williams
13 of Williams’ 20 goals have come since the start of January. In addition, all four of Williams’ game-winners have come during the winning run. His leadership has obviously played a huge role too, but his production also rose when the team really needed it.
The reinforcements
Greg McKegg played his first regular season game in a Carolina Hurricanes uniform on January 4 which means that the turnaround started pretty close to when he came into the picture. Saku Maenalanen played one game with the Hurricanes in early December but was then recalled on January 3, also coinciding with the team’s turnaround. Though Niederreiter rightfully gets the headlines of the newcomers, I think McKegg and Maenalanen made a huge contribution toward improbably stabilizing and making deeper the forward lineup when Jordan Staal was out due to his concussion. Further, I think that four-line depth has been integral to the team’s road success. With a deep blue line, the forward depth made it so that opposing coach’s could not prey on weaknesses for easy wins as was the case in 2017-18.
Notably missing from my list are team leaders Sebastian Aho, Teuvo Teravainen and Jaccob Slavin. All three have contributed significantly to the team’s 2019 success, but the trio has been pretty steady through the 2018-19 campaign such they were not so much 2019 spikes.
What say you Canes fans?
1) In your opinion, which of the turnarounds noted above has been most significant in the team’s rise in the standings?
2) Who has other 2019 turnarounds/statistics that should be added to such a list?
Go Canes!
In general, I would say scoring more goals has been the biggest difference. These two hard-to-believe stats comparing the periods of season-start to Dec 31 and then Jan 1 to now kind of say it all:
– from 30th to 1st in goals scored
– from 28th to 9th on PP%
Further, all this without any “slippage” in our defense: the PK% and goals-allowed/game have held steady.
As the playoffs approach, goals are going to become tougher to score so I don’t expect us to continue to score as many goals as we have recently. In any event, when you net out a high-scoring offense with steady defense and reliable goaltending, you’re going to win a lot of games.
Again, we are going to be a tough out for anyone down the stretch and into the playoffs if we just show up and play this game. Only a few teams in the league are playing as well as we are right now. Unfortunately, WAS is one of them.
Well done, Matt. I was unaware of Roddy’s complete success as a coach. This team is playing much better than I expected.
Roddy’s detractors are saying that he was a bad coach early in the season but has grown into the job lately. Bull manure!
The team started off as an uncertain group of young untested players with a few veterans mixed in. It took them a while, but they have finally started to gel.
The detractors would have us believe that in the early going Roddy stupidly clung to what wasn’t working instead of abandoning what wasn’t working in order to try something new. Anyone who ever played and/or coached a team sport knows that it takes time for a new team to buy into a coach’s system. Any coach who abandons his system in the short term because it doesn’t appear to be working is a fool who didn’t believe in his system to begin with. As for the detractors? Well, we can win the Cup and they will still complain. Listening to them is to try to make sense out of nonsense.
However, my prediction of last week is coming true. We have lost two players to injury, Ferland and deHaan. Both men were injured in plays where no foul was called. Fishy got force-fed an elbow and butt end sandwich last night. He left the ice bleeding from the mouth and nose. No call. But he returned to the game later. That is one focused and gutsy kid. I love him. I do. Wow!
Please Ronny. Don’t send in Fleury if deHaan needs some down time. How about Denouf or Carrick? Pullleeeze?
Since the beginning of the turnaround Fleury has played in 4 NHL games. The Canes are 4-0 in those 4 games. Dan Renouf has quietly had a good season in Charlotte. He was a free agent signed on a one year 2 way contract with the Canes. He will be a “group 6 UFA” at the end of the season because he has reached the age of 24 without playing in a minimum of 80 NHL games. He was drafted by the Red Wings, appeared in one NHL game, and played 3 seasons with the Griffins of the AHL.
Another good article, Matt! This season, especially since January, has been fun. We are truly getting this ship headed in the right direction. Totally changing the subject of this article, but have you heard anything regarding whether Adam Fox will be signing with us or do you think he is going to test the market this summer?
The Canes own signing rights for Fox. If he wants to jump into the NHL asap he will need to sign here. That is unlikely to happen before his season at Harvard is over. Harvard is currently in their conference finals and will likely be in the college hockey national tournament. The Frozen Four (NCAA finals) won’t be over until the NHL playoffs have begun. Hopefully both the Canes and Checkers are stilling playing then. Fox could sign, play in a game(s) and burn the first year of his ELC (entry level contract). The biggest benefit of his signing now as he will reach free agency a year sooner than if he waits. If he were to finish college unsigned he would become a UFA since he is over 20 and ineligible to re-enter the draft. As a UFA he can sign wherever he wants for whatever deal his agent can negotiate. Fox is in the situation where he has a “bird in hand”, the known entity of an NHL ELC or “two in the bush”, the unknown of a future “theoretically better” deal yet made.
Like any successful organization/endeavor the Canes have replaced but with and. The offense is scoring and the defense is top 10 in the league. The penalty kill has really improved and the power play is slightly above average. The goaltending has been solid and the fourth line is dramatically improved.
The math leads me to believe that much of the success is due to improvement on the 1st and 4th lines. Aho becoming a point-per-game center who creates goals for Ferland/Niederreiter/Williams has made a big impact.
The fourth line’s math stands out. Last year in a combined 154 games, Nordstrom/Kruger/Jooris combined for 6 goals. McKegg and Maenalanen have 10 in 59 combined games.
In 2019 the Canes have move beyond:
having stretches with good goaltending but no offense; experiencing production from the top line but no production from the fourth line;
winning two games but then losing the next three.
To me, Matt, the biggest turnaround is the boys playing with energy and heart – atttributes that were noticeably missing in December (and a few games since, of course). The individual factors you mention are a product of that.
One of peers here made a reference early in the season that he saw the play going from go-go-go and taking chances while allowing mistakes to trying to minimize mistakes. I think RBA has re-opened the game up again and one of the reasons he can do that is the stellar goaltending courtesy of Petr and Mac. Mistakes aren’t generally finding their way in the back of the net. And that is huge – this team is good when it can forecheck hard and keep the puck in the offensive zone – we have a lot of opportunistic scorers, right down to the 4th line and forechecking creates chaos which rewards opportunistic scoring.
Another big difference I have noticed in style of play is our ability to more confidently move the puck through the neutral zone – no longer are we too frequently relying on dump and chase, or a certain left-winger (not to be named) trying to move the puck into the offensive zone on his stick while playing 1-on-N hockey, where N > 1. Moving the puck quickly and confidently into the offensive zone and at pace creates opportunities before the defense can really set up.
This is a difference from your article – more of an overview or systemic view, which you are looking at the individual pieces, but it all feeds together.
I long said that the team’s success would hinge on how well RBA would go into the job and learn it while doing it. He no longer had the deer-in-the-headlight look he sometimes displayed earlier in the season and when you listen to him you can hear him acknowledge how much he has learned and grown as a coach.
Very good goal-tending is the most important key to the Canes current success. It allows a more aggressive style of play that has boosted our scoring.
Another critical factor is that we are a MUCH heavier team compared to last year. This was really on display during the beginning of the most-recent Boston game. No “tail between the legs” anymore makes me a very happy fan. Management deserves credit for dynamically transforming this team.
1) All of the above. This turnaround has been a total team effort, starting with the captain and including every player.
2) another statistic : 6 roster players moved since the start of the season: Darling, Zykov, PDG, Necas, Rask, and Fleury. I wasn’t sure about the “management by committee” approach but have to say they have been decisive and were also a critical part of this turn around.