In the blink of an eye, the Carolina Hurricanes went from an 11-game win streak — their longest in franchise history — to four straight losses riddled with errors, not to mention last Sunday’s soporific loss to the Vancouver Canucks.
What went wrong, and how can head coach Rod Brind’Amour’s squad of talented hockey players fix it? From reshuffling a shallow defense to fixing the power play once and for all, there’s plenty Carolina can look toward in the latter half of the regular season. After all, a playoff bid is all but guaranteed at this point — the Hurricanes just need to capitalize on their talent and maybe consider a few line changes.
Lackluster goaltending
The return of netminder Frederik Andersen during Jan. 12’s game in Columbus was encouraging, to say the least — especially given fellow goalie Pyotr Kochetkov’s slump after posting a 7-0-1 record in December. That being said, backup goaltender Antti Raanta wasn’t looking so hot, either, and given Andersen’s medical history, Carolina needs both of its backup goalies to shape up or ship out.
In a way, Kochetkov is doing both — Hurricanes general manager Don Waddell announced on Jan. 16 that the rookie had been reassigned to the Chicago Wolves, Carolina’s AHL affiliate, after a particularly rough performance against the Canucks. In doing so, Andersen and Raanta will have more room to practice while Kochetkov builds up momentum in Chicago.
Hopefully, we’ll see more of Andersen over the coming weeks, but it would be nice to see an improvement from Raanta, as well. He effectively saved Carolina from dropping out of the playoffs in round one last season after Andersen’s MCL tear, and the veteran goalie has quickly become a fan favorite.
Who’s on second?
Finding the center to compliment Carolina’s two best forwards — Martin Necas and Andrei Svechnikov — has been a seemingly endless battle on Brind’Amour’s front over the past several weeks. At the beginning of the season, it was Jesperi Kotkaniemi, but Paul Stastny has stepped up recently to take center ice between Necas and Svechnikov.
The trouble is, Kotkaniemi keeps getting better and better — and while you can’t say Stastny has been playing poorly, maybe it’s time to pull Kotkaniemi out of the bottom six. He ranks ahead of Stastny in goals and points, and he’s pushing the best faceoff stats of his career.
Power play woes continue
It’s a disappointingly impressive feat to not score a single power play goal against the worst penalty killers in the league, and that’s just what the Hurricanes pulled off on Sunday, Jan. 15 against the Canucks.
In light of Vancouver’s 66.7% penalty kill, 20 percentage points behind the Boston Bruins, you would’ve expected at least one power play goal from the same team that put up 67 shots against the Nashville Predators, but that wasn’t the case. In fact, in between Carolina’s two games on Jan. 10 and Jan. 12, the Hurricanes were 0-7 on the power play but 3-9 on shorthanded goals. That’s pretty remarkable.
In the coming weeks and months, Carolina’s offensive lines need to put an extended emphasis on the man advantage at practice. There’s no reason a team with their level of offensive success should do poorly on the power play.
Does Carolina’s third pairing need depth?
It’s not the Jaccob Slavin/Brent Burns or Brady Skjei/Brett Pesce defensive duos that need work — we need a stable, successful third pairing, and Dylan Coghlan just isn’t going to cut it. For that matter, does Carolina need to upgrade Jalen Chatfield or Calvin de Haan?
Personally, I’m not so sure they do. Chalking up the Hurricanes’ recent losses to poor goaltending, as I mentioned earlier, all three of Carolina’s defensive pairings have performed well. Chatfield in particular has stepped up, scoring four goals since Dec. 22. Although not as flashy as Caniacs would like, de Haan is a hockey veteran with plenty of experience under his belt.
At the end of the day, Brind’Amour’s faith in Chatfield and de Haan will serve them both well. Especially under the guidance of defensive superstars like Slavin and Burns, there’s no reason Carolina should drop either member of the third pairing. They might do well to trade Coghlan, though.
