Alex Zachman
Hurricanes goalie Cam Ward and Jets forward Paul Stastny watch as a puck goes slightly wide during a in the second period of a 3-2 Hurricanes loss at PNC Arena on Sunday March 4. Winnipeg had only four shots on goal in the second period and a total of 23 in the game.
The Carolina Hurricanes put forth a solid effort Sunday night, but it was not quite enough to top one of the NHL’s top teams, as the Canes fell 3-2 to the Winnipeg Jets at PNC Arena.
Forward and leading point getter Teuvo Teravainen scored in the second period for the Canes (29-26-11) to extend his goal streak to three games and his point streak to four, and Jordan Staal brought Carolina within a goal with a late third-period tally. Jets (39-17-9) forward Patrik Laine scored a pair of goals. Goalie Cam Ward stopped 20 of 23 shots; Carolina outshot Winnipeg 35-23 for the game.
Special teams played a key role in this one, as the Jets capitalized on one of their two power plays on the night, while the Canes went 0 for 3 up a man.
“Specialty teams were huge,” head coach Bill Peters said. “We were minus one tonight in a one-goal loss. You can say that’s the difference in the hockey game if you want to go down that road. Just execution in general, I thought we thought we could have executed a little bit better throughout the game, on the power play, with the puck.”
The Jets jumped out to a quick lead, as Laine, one of the most dangerous shooters in the NHL, zipped a perfectly-placed shot through Ward’s five hole to make it 1-0 less than six minutes in.
“[The Jets] are deep,” Peters said. “They’re very deep; they score lots. They seem to score, I don’t want to say easy, but they have the ability to score. It comes off [Laine]’s stick different. It’s jumping off his stick. I thought he was real dangerous.”
The Canes tied it with just 1:29 left in the first; directly after a power play expired, Teravainen threw a puck on net that banked in off Jets defenseman Dmitry Kulikov, who was fighting for positioning with Staal in front of Winnipeg goalie Connor Hellebuyck.
“[Teravainen]’s way more competitive on a consistent basis right now than he’s ever been, probably in his career,” Peters said.
Laine restored a 2-1 lead for the Jets on an early second-period, with another snap wrister that deflected off Canes forward Brock McGinn and through Ward’s pads.
Carolina carried play for most of the middle frame, outshooting Winnipeg 17-4, but could not get a puck past Hellebuyck. There were second-chance opportunities to be had off of Hellebuyck, but the Canes seemed to be one step away from those rebounds throughout the game.
“You need to work and try to get body positioning for sure,” said Canes forward Jeff Skinner, who finished the game with six shots on goal. “It’s tough because they’re obviously trying to prevent you from doing that. Sometimes it’s just where the puck falls. … You’ve got to make sure you’re there, and maybe we can do a little better job of trying to establish body positioning and go from there.”
Winnipeg took a 3-1 lead about halfway through the third period on a fortuitous bounce; defenseman Ben Chiarot put a shot off the crossbar that struck an official in the face and landed in a perfect location for forward Paul Stastny to deposit it into an open net.
“I swear a few games ago there was some odd bounce off the ref and they blew it down,” Staal said. “They said they wouldn’t allow a goal like that. It was tough, obviously, to watch that go in.”
The Canes got within one with 4:12 to play, as Staal picked up a loose puck off the rebound of a shot from defenseman Jaccob Slavin and snapped it past Hellebuyck to make it 3-2.
Carolina pulled Ward for an extra skater with a little over two minutes to play, but could not find the equalizer, ending the team’s point streak at three.
“They made it hard to get to the net and they made it hard to create plays,” Staal said. “That’s what good teams do. We still need to find a way to win some games.”
The loss, coupled with the Florida Panthers and Columbus Blue Jackets’ wins, moves the Hurricanes two points behind Columbus and a point behind Florida for the Eastern Conference’s second wild card spot with 16 games to go, though the Panthers have three games in hand on the Canes.
“You’re always trying to get to the next level,” Skinner said. “We’ve done a better job as of late. We want to keep getting better. Obviously the games are getting tighter and there’s less and less room out there as you get down the stretch. You need to match that level of intensity and exceed it to keep climbing. That’s what we’re going to try and do.”
Carolina will hit the road to take on the Minnesota Wild Tuesday night.