For Caniacs who have been away from Canes and Coffee over the holidays Happy New Year and welcome back!
After a short hiatus from the regular Coffee Shop posts, I figured a special Tuesday edition to start the new year was in order.
Today’s belated Monday Coffee Shop features a short set of polls that looks back on the 2017-18 season thus far and forward to what’s ahead.
Carolina Hurricanes polls
Please remember to click ‘vote’ after each individual poll response.
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Discussion questions
1) If you had to assess the Carolina Hurricanes 2017-18 season thus far in two sentences or less, how would you do so?
2) Per Monday’s Daily Cup of Joe that detailed the schedule ahead, what is your realistic hope for the tough run of seven games against tough competition?
3) What are the top one or two keys to finding the next gear and pushing up above the playoff cut line in the second half of the season?
Go Canes!
1. A roller coaster of a season, showing a bunch of progress and a bunch of strain on my overall mental health.
2. Honestly, my realistic hope is to see the team’s newfound fire game in and game out for the next seven days. Obviously their is a statistical number the team would like to hit, but I want to see a constant effort.
3. More Lucas Wallmark. Okay maybe not him specifically, but his first goal of the season was exactly the type of goal the team needs and hasn’t been scoring consistently. Right in front of the net, with a very pretty deflection. That needs to keep up.
The second key is obviously finding the right touch with our goalie tandem, keeping Ward relatively fresh, while figuring out how to close Darling’s 5 hole on the regs.
1. Which team is going to show up tonight? What happened to Darling on the road from Chicago to Raleigh?
2. I have always said, if you are going to be the best – you have to beat the best. I can see us realistically getting 7 of 14 points (splitting with the Caps, beating BOS and CGY) – and that would be my benchmark. PIT at their barn and TBY anywhere are tough gets, but how we do against them will offer a lot of information on the team going forward after the break.
3. Line adjustments (Aho in center) and call-ups from Charlotte should be the key. Players like Ryan, PDG, and McGinn are edge players and could be displaced. What I am expecting, though, is Wallmark being returned to Charlottte after Kruger’s return – but hopefully he continues his success from his first outing this season and makes the case to stay and play in the bigs.
1/ I have never been this excited and as close to giving up hockey forever, and I’ve had both feelings many times on the same day. It’s like running a startup: the highs are really high and the lows are really low. I wouldn’t complain if things were to level out a bit here.
2/ I hope we show up, start on time, stay disciplined, and compete for 60-minutes. If we do those things, we’ll get the results.
3/ Tap into our depth in CLT for a spark: Wallmark was very good and is NHL ready; I’d bet a few games on Zykov, too. Our special teams have been noticeable better over the past 8 games; being better here is worth at least .5 goals/game. That should be plenty good enough.
One interesting scheduling tidbit: NYR have played 24 home games and only 15 on the road. As this evens out over the second half of the season, it wouldn’t be surprising at all for them to drop off their current point pace.
1. Exciting and disappointing at the same time. And very hooking to see if they lose or win their next game.
2. 4 points out of 2 wins and 3 points out of OT/SO losses, total of 7.
3. Moving Aho to center for good. Playing Cam Ward as a starting goalie now that it is critical times ahead. I would any time give Darling more “practicing time” to see if he can fix his thing but the team cannot afford the gamble right now. Btw, my bet and the vote on the poll is that the Canes, unfortunately, fall very short of a playoff spot, like 1 point or a goal difference and that it takes closer to 100 than 95 points to get a wild card spot this year. It is not only what the Canes can do but what the other teams do, for example Crosby still hasn’t decided to play yet and NYI has a great bunch this year including the rookie Barzal.
1. Inconsistency, and more mediocrity
2. Reality tells me that there’s little hope to exceed .500
3. Either bringing up help from Charlotte, making a trade, or BOTH!
Happy New Year all!
During the hustle and bustle of the holiday season, I still found time to read and appreciate all of the great reader insight and viewpoints (usually on my phone between other things) that make The Coffee Shop my favorite part of Canes and Coffee.
One of the positives of settling back into a normal routine in January is that I hope to again be a more regular part of the conversation.
1. Looking through the big picture lens, continued slow, albeit slightly unsteady, progress toward the goal of having the Canes relevant again.
2. Compete, hope the goaltending doesn’t go south and get half the points and be happy. Giddy even.
3. To me the last few weeks have been encouraging (yes!). I’ve seen a slightly different team, much more willing to play play-off type hockey. More physical, aggressive and overall playing better by playing that style. I didn’t think the Canes were being built as a playoff team, too soft, too willing to play on the outside and not aggressive enough. The addition of Justin Williams to the team has helped tremendously in that regard. He’s hard on the body, hard to the net, hard in one on one puck battles and that attitude and style of play seems to have been picked up by a few others. I’m more confident now in their play than at any time in the last 4-5 years. They’re not a juggernaut, but there is no question they’re better than recent incarnations. Unfortunately, so is most of the Metro division.
The second key is competent goal tending. I think they’ve dodged a bullet so far with Darling’s struggles and Ward has done an exemplary job of filling in until Darling gets his act together. Good goal tending covers up lots of mistakes and bad goaltending highlights those mistakes. We need above average play between the pipes or all bets are off.