Gold: Canes looking for bounce back in Tampa

By Adam Gold radio host 99.9 the Fan

For the first time this season the Carolina Hurricanes will be looking to bounce back from a loss. Saturday night, before we turned out clocks back one hour it appeared the Hurricanes were already confused by the unusual 6:00 pm start time as Florida rolled to a 4-0 lead after one period en route to a 4-2 win in Sunrise.

Penalties were the major culprit in the loss as the Panthers connected three times on the power play in the opening 20 minutes. It began almost immediately as Jaccob Slavin was tossed for tripping just 37 seconds in which negated what looked like a developing 3-on-1 scoring chance.

“It took away a chance for us”, head coach Rod Brind’Amour said. “It was like a 2-goal swing with the one we could have had and it ended up giving them a goal.”

But, the reality is that you still have to kill those penalties and that has been one of the best part of Carolina’s 9-1-0 start to the season. Even with allowing the trio of power play goals and 5 in the last four games, the Canes’ penalty kill is 10th best in the NHL at 84.8%. The problem is that it will eventually catch up to you if you take as many penalties as Carolina has so far this season.

The Hurricanes are 27th in the NHL in penalty minutes at 11.3 per night and in five of their 10 games so far they’ve been shorthanded at least five times. What’s worse is that they’ve been on the kill at least three times in every game. Throw in the absence of Brett Pesce and staying out of the box is even more important for the Hurricanes.

Special Numbers...

Don’t be fooled by Tampa Bay’s somewhat depressed power play numbers (6 for 33, 18.2%), they’re still rolling Steven Stamkos, Brayden Point, Ondrej Palat, Alex Killorn and Victor Hedman out there. Stamkos has three power play goals on the season, and Point rung the bell three times with the man advantage during last spring’s playoffs, as Tampa’s power play cashed in 7 times in the 4-1 series win.

Carolina’s power play has not been as sharp of late. “We’ve got a tendency to be too cute at times”, Brind’Amour said. “You have an extra guy out there, so sometimes you just need to put the puck on net and go to work.” The Hurricanes are still sporting a top 10 power play in the NHL (10 for 39, 25.6%), but it’s only connected on 4 of their last 20 and just once during a 5-minute major penalty in Florida.

Paint it blue…

Andrei Vasilivskiy is, according to Carolina’s head coach, the ‘best goalie in the world”. And, you can debate that all you want, but his numbers against the Hurricanes in the regular season would certainly make you feel that way. Vasilevskiy is 10-3-1 with a .934 SV% against the Canes. Meanwhile, Frederik Andersen hasn’t fared as well over the years. Freddie is just 5-10-1 with an .880 SV% all time against the Bolts.

Coming and going…

Nino Niederreiter was placed on injured reserve by the Hurricanes today as they called up Josh Leivo from Chicago in the American Hockey League. Leivo has three assists in three games with the Wolves and if he were to draw in would be skating for his 4th different NHL team (Toronto, Vancouver and Calgary). The team also brought up goalie Alex Lyon from the Wolves after Antti Raanta suffered the upper body injury Saturday in Florida.

The lineup…

Svechnikov-Aho-Teravainen

Kotkaniemi-Trocheck-Necas

Lorentz-Staal-Fast

Martinook-Stepan-Jarvis

Slavin-Bear

Skjei-DeAngelo

Smith-Cole

Andersen

The Line…

Tampa Bay -125, O/U 5.5

Storm Watch starring Alec Campbell starts at 6:30 on 99.9 the Fan. Then catch the play by play with Mike Maniscalco and Tripp Tracy starting just after 7:00. Follow the Canes Corner Podcast wherever you get your podcasts. A new episode drops after every Hurricanes game.