With two home games and now two road games completed, here is a quick assessment of where the Hurricanes are at this very early juncture of the season.
In the standings
My playoff math says that a team must get two-thirds of the points at home and half of the points on the road to finish around 95 total which is usually a point or two above the playoff cut line. By this math, the Hurricanes are some tiny fraction of a point above a playoff pace through four games. That is a good thing, especially for a team whose recent seasons have all been doomed by lack of production in October and November.
In net
Especially with Scott Darling making a significant transition to a new team, a new role and a new amount of pressure as a starter and Cam Ward sliding into a backup role for the first time in about a decade, I think the goaltending checks out well through four games. Ironically, Darling was not great in his lone win to start the season, but he played well in both of the losses only allowing a single regulation goal in each. Ward followed up Darling’s three starts with a decent start of his own on Tuesday night and seized a win in his first start in the backup role.
The blue line
The blue line is still very much a work in progress right now. Peters’ initial decision to split Jaccob Slavin and Brett Pesce lasted all of one period into the season opener before he reverted back to mostly playing Slavin and Pesce together, cheating a bit and also using them elsewhere and trying to make what lies behind that hold together.
The third pairing has struggled since Trevor van Riemsdyk was shelved with an injury. Maybe not surprisingly since we saw the same in 2016-17, Klas Dahlbeck just is not a great fit for a #7 role because his game falls off too much playing on the right side instead of his natural left side. On Tuesday, Peters’ solution to the third pairing was to limit the two players (Haydn Fleury and Trevor Carrick) to an average of about nine minutes and play Slavin and Pesce for almost half of the game to make up for it. Hopefully, van Riemsdyk returns and helps solidify the bottom pairing, but early indications are that blue line depth could again be an Achilles’ heel if the Hurricanes lose a player or two to injury.
Noah Hanifin and Justin Faulk have been more good than bad but have each had some rough patches already. Hanifin had a really tough first game but has settled down since then. Faulk has similarly been more good than bad but still has too many instances where he is caught flat-footed or just does not close gaps quickly enough. The mobility issues have resulted in four minor penalties through four games for Faulk.
Much like 2016-17, the Hurricanes are winning at even strength with Slavin/Pesce on the ice. Pesce leads the team at plus 4, and Slavin is just behind him at plus 3. But the team is losing with any other defensemen on the ice. Hanifin is a team worst minus 3; Faulk is right behind him at minus 2; Fleury is minus 1.
In short, the blue line that is projected to be a strength is still very much a work in progress at this early stage of the season.
The forwards
I wrote ad nauseam about the forward situation last week and will be brief here. With two big scoring outbursts and two meager nights offensively, I think something like ‘hot and cold’ or ‘inconsistent’ could be accurate tags for the offense.
The fourth line has been pretty good with both Brock McGinn and Josh Jooris in the right wing slot and seems to be gaining Bill Peters’ trust in addition to figuring heavily in the penalty killing. I am not sure anything else is really settled in terms of line combinations. Both Janne Kuokkanen and Martin Necas have shown flashes of being capable of playing at the NHL level, but through four games, neither has appeared on the score sheet. And though Tuesday’s five-goal outburst significantly boosted a number of players’ scoring paces, the real measure of where the team is offensively might be whether it can at least muster some offense in the next game where things do not seem to magically click.
Per my notes from the 5-3 win over Edmonton, I think that game could well have been a step in the direction of Necas ultimately playing most of the 2017-18 season elsewhere where he can log a ton of minutes in all situations, continue to round out his game and in the process not burn the first year of his entry-level contract. I think Kuokkanen’s game is more well-rounded and also that Lee Stempniak could prove to be a modest boost to the lineup as another experienced NHLer with a decent offensive tool bag.
The shorter version is that the Hurricanes forward lines have run so hot and cold, it is hard to figure exactly what the reality is yet.
What say you Canes fans?
Do you agree with my assessments?
Am I being too hard on the blue line?
Now with two good games and two bad games for the forwards (at least in terms of goal scoring), what do you make of the group so far?
Go Canes!
I believe we are harder on the defense than we should because we rely on them so heavily. There plus minus is skewed because of a lack of scoring. Fleury has been solid in his time. One bad play resulted in a goal and his minus 1. Again the lack of offense hasn’t made up for Hanifin’s 2 mistakes in game one. Hanifin is positioning is much better than game won and he was won many puck battles. The most concerning with Faulk is his shot is terribly off. We need his goals to survive.
The points count the same but our wins are against injury riddled teams playing their backup goalies. 9 goals against backups, 2 against starters. Hopefully this game started the confidence of Staal (4 points, i think) and TT.
gocanes0506, all the things you have pointed out are right on IMO. You have really hit the highlights on some of the individual players performance. Referencing your last paragraph, next game, if Calgary plays Smith, I’m looking forward to seeing whether we can score some 5 on 5 goals with a couple of them being the dirty type battling down low.
1. Your assessments: They are certainly well thought out and believe me when I say they are more likely to be correct than anything I could put together. As sort of the moderator, better you take the approach of the cup more as half empty than the half full approach IMO. I have a tendency to be an optimist. You know, the type of guy who is standing in front of the firing squad smiling because I believe in divine intervention and everything will be all right.
2. Too hard on the blue line: Maybe. In last night’s game the forwards spent most of the night in the defensive zone skating helter skelter chasing the puck. The fact that despite all the mayhem things didn’t get way out of hand was probably because of the play of the defensemen. Outside of Faulk’s nonchalant playing, IMO the defense held things together. The forwards need to help out by possessing the puck more and getting more faceoffs than they did last night.
3. Thoughts on forwards: At this point it appears to me that we truly could benefit from another scoring type forward (Duchene, McDavid (oops how’d that get in here), Neal, etc. and this team would be a very good bet to be in the playoffs. We have a couple of bonafide top six forwards in Skinner and Williams. From there we drop down to having an abundance of third line type forwards who we are hoping will step up their games.
These have been such different – and disjointed – games, it is hard for me to be able to come to any conclusions. I think you are a little too hard on the blue line. Hanifin has stepped up. Fleury is quietly solid. Slavin and Pesce are, well, Slavin and Pesce. And other teams respect Faulk’s shot, which should create openings. But that said we really don’t have depth there.
I think our forwards have been a real mixed bag. I liked that we good opportunities last night and used them. I think the line shuffling really helped. But there is no identity yet in the forwards – they are still feeling out the season in many ways.
I do like the goaltending – I think that is the positive. Darling h as been strong and Ward indicated last night that he should be able to step into the backup role.
1. Yes I agree with your assessment. I really think the team needs Stempniak back or for now just go with both Jooris and McGinn because if the rookies (Kuokkanen and Necas) are not going to play better have them elsewhere. I wish they could both go down together and make Charlotte a really scary team, and they could recall Diguiseppe to be the 13th forward.
2. Yeah I think a little too hard. Slavin and Pesce have been great (start of season rust accounted for) overall. Faulk and Hanifin are better at offense and they’ve definitely helped the transition, and not known for their defense they’ve stayed afloat enough in my opinion. They don’t defend in an efficient way like Slavin and Pesce, sometimes they turn it over but I’ve liked their effort to recover and still disrupt the play. They’ve been passable defensively and good offensively so i’ll take that for the start. Third pairing has been a tire fire but Fleury looks decent and worst case scenario Peters goes Quenville mode and slogs his top 4 with 90% of the ice time. The return of TVR will really help, even more than Stempniak will help the forwards.
3. The offense is still a struggle in my opinion. While the rookies have higher offensive ceilings than some of the guys who’ve played bottom 6 minutes in the NHL (Jooris, Mcginn, Diguiseppe), they just aren’t capitalizing and I thought the Canes forward group looked the best in the Edmonton game (and really Necas didn’t play) so it was just 11 ‘veterans’. Stempniak will help when he’s back. Still praying for some magical roster adding trade (even if just a slightly cheaper option – David Perron?) to help the offense.
You’re waaaaaay too hard on the blueline, in my opinion, Matt. If these first four games showed anything at all (outside of the youth of our team) it’s that consistent scoring remains a problem. Using plus/minus in this scenario is completely unfair. Outside of the first game, which looked like a first game, the defensive play has been relatively solid. Fleury is a rookie, and while he’s making some mistakes, he’s playing absolutely a suitable NHL defenseman level and that’s big for us.
It’s clearly been the offense that needs to step up game in and game out. You know me, I’m a glass half full kind of guy. I’m freaking out about nothing with this team. Best start in five years, best talent in five years, best goaltending in five years, and I’m still prepared to bet that it will be the best finish in five years. Let the rooks keep playing (that’s how they get better) and let this thing play out for a month or two before we start wigging out. When we lose more than four in a row, then I’ll start being concerned.
Just some general observations…..Kuokkanen has played well despite being held off the score sheet. The difference in his play (solid, unafraid) and Necas’s play (tenative, weak on the puck) is dramatic.
Fleury has played exceptionally well in his brief time. Sure a mistake or two surfaced, but, in aggregate, he’s been quite good.
Hanifin plays better with Faulk and Faulk plays better with Hanifin. I get why Peters wants to break up Pesce and Slavin (spreading the defensive wealth), but it hasn’t worked out as planned. Besides, Justin and Noah seem to feed off of each other defensively anyway.
I like Aho w/Rask and Lindholm. I hope they stay together for a handful of games to see if they can reclick. I also like the Teravainen/Staal/Williams line. I believe we may have found something there.
Darling really hasn’t seen a 35 or 40 shot effort and until he does the jury remains out. Cam, as much as I hate to say it, looked very good against Edmonton, the 5-hole softie notwithstanding.
I think this will be a test against a very good Calgary team with a hot goalie.