The Carolina Hurricanes suffered a predictable defeat against the New Jersey Devils on Sunday, March 12, getting shut out 3-0.
In their third game in four days, the Canes (43-14-8) looked sloppy against the Devils (44-16-6), who came ready to play.
There are no other words to describe this game other than disappointing for Carolina. In the past two games, the Hurricanes have failed to score on a combined 65 shots on goal, an incompetent offensive display.
The Canes have definitely entered a rough stretch of play in recent games, which is unfortunate considering the time of year and the opponents coming up during the final sprint of the season. With this loss, Carolina remains barely in first place in the Metropolitan Division, tied in points with the Devils with a game in hand.
6:44 into the first period, Devils center Jack Hughes stripped the puck from Canes defenseman Calvin de Haan in his own zone and scored, putting the Canes down early in what proved to be the game-deciding goal. De Haan, seemingly caught off guard by Hughes’ pressure, gave up the puck in embarrassing fashion just two games after a similar incident on Thursday, March 9 against the Philadelphia Flyers.
Just over two minutes later, the Devils capitalized again on a Hurricanes turnover and went up 2-0.
Just when the Canes were able to get their feet under themselves towards the end of the first and the beginning of the second period, goaltender Pyotr Kochetkov gave up the puck under pressure, leading to the Devils’ third goal, which cemented their win.
It would be easy to write off this loss as a tired Canes team making a few mistakes that cost them the game; however, New Jersey has also played three games in the past four days and didn’t suffer the same degradation in play. The Devils played like this game meant something to them, whereas the Canes looked careless in the first half of the game with the number of errors and no-look passes that reached no one but the other team.
The most upsetting part is other than the three giveaways that led to goals, the Devils were also struggling to get good offensive chances themselves. But when you give a team as talented as the Devils three easy goals, that’s hard to come back from.
The Canes were missing a few key pieces this game. Defenseman Jalen Chatfield and goaltender Antti Raanta have been absent the past few games with their respective injuries. Right wing Andrei Svechnikov missed tonight’s game due to a lower-body injury suffered against the Vegas Golden Knights on Saturday, March 12, in which he had to leave the game early.
The Hurricanes were in a similar situation earlier in the season just after their historic winning streak, so it’s too early to panic about how the team is performing. This is a team that is designed to play a game that creates chances off the forecheck — when they can’t establish an effective forecheck, the Canes fail to score effectively.
Carolina will look to get on the scoreboard and right the ship against the Winnipeg Jets on Tuesday, March 9 at 7 p.m.
