Before I get into today's matchup vs the visiting Hurricanes I wanted to share the poll results from yesterday.

It appears that fans like the defensive zone coverage the most about this young season and I would agree. D zone coverage made up 41% of the 588 votes and I was one of those votes.

The fact is without proper d zone coverage Marc Andre Fleury would not even have the opportunity to be successful. That is not to take anything away from Fleury but so far he has just had to avoid the colossal mistake. Fleury was a deserving second in the voting with 26%.

Olli Maatta had 16%, Chuck Kobasew had 13%, and Tanner Glass/Other both had 1%.

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Pittsburgh Penguins (2-0-0) vs Carolina Hurricanes (1-0-1) 7 PM Consol Energy Center

This is the first ever matchup as division rivals for the Penguins and Hurricanes. So far both teams have a victory against a Metropolitan Division opponent in this young season. The Penguins handled the New Jersey Devils in their opener and the Hurricanes were able to defeat the flailing Philadelphia Flyers in their second game.

Currently the Hurricanes are 1 point behind the Penguins for the division lead and are looking to start strong in an effort to set a positive tone for the year. The Hurricanes will be working hard to return to the playoffs after missing out the past few seasons.

Any time the Penguins and Hurricanes meet, especially in Pittsburgh, one of the main storylines will always be Jordan Staal.

Staal is entering his first full 82 game season for the Hurricanes and he will be relied on heavily to provide not only shutdown defense in his 2nd line center role, but also provide quality offense. Through the first two games Jordan has been held without a point but he has played well given his usage.

The Hurricanes have been leaning on Jordan pretty hard so far defensively. Staal has started only 23.5% of his faceoffs in the offensive zone through 2 games. Despite that difficult starting point his FF% is an impressive 54.8%. This should come as no surprise to the folks who follow the Penguins as we have seen up close how Jordan is able to handle the toughest of defensive assignments and still manage to be successful. It's just Jordan being Jordan.

So far in this young season USA Olympic hopeful Justin Faulk has split the shutdown defense role with former Sabre Andrej Sekera. They both have an OZ% of 27.8%. It wouldn't be surprising to see that duo up against the Crosby line tonight, depending on Tim Gleason's status (more on that below).

I previously mentioned that Jordan Staal is currently pointless on the year, but so is his brother Eric as well as Alex Semin. That is a trend that will probably end sooner rather than later.

The Hurricanes could be welcoming back two quality players to their lineup this evening. Tim Gleason (concussion) and Tuomo Ruutu (lower body injury) have both made the trip to Pittsburgh and will be re-evaluated today. Both players are solid and would definitely give the Hurricanes a boost.

Young Hurricanes star Jeff Skinner is leading the team in scoring with 3 points. He is also leading the Hurricanes in puck possession with a FF% of 67.9%.

On the Penguins side of things there really isn't much to add. They need to stay the course and continue to do the things that have made them successful through the first two regular season games. Patient forechecking has led to the forwards being in great position in the neutral zone. This has allowed the Penguins defense to maintain excellent gap control which leads to very few controlled zone entries and even fewer odd man rushes.

My bold prediction for the game tonight: Former Hurricane Craig Adams will not maintain his 82 goal pace, very bold stuff there.

Look for Jussi Jokinen to have a quality game as he plays against the team who traded him away for nothing and even ate some salary to get rid of him. Brandon Sutter will most likely find some additional motivation too for similar reasons. Players love to prove to old teams that they made a "mistake".


I will update the blog as the day goes on with line combos, PP combos, as well as the starting goalies as more information is released. Also be on the lookout for an injury update on Kris Letang. Letang can technically play tonight but he has yet to skate with the team since his injury and it is not likely he plays tonight. Letang has been skating before practice on his own.

Keep checking back in throughout the day for updates

UPDATE 10:45 AM

Penguins line combos

Kunitz-Crosby-Dupuis
Jokinen-Malkin-Bennett
Jeffrey-Sutter-Kobasew
Glass-Vitale-Adams

Orpik-Martin
Scuderi-Niskanen
Maatta-Bortuzzo-Engelland

First defensive line rush had Engelland-Bortuzzo and then Engelland-Maatta. It appears Engelland will be making his season debut tonight.

Fleury and Zatkoff present

Kris Letang was noticeably skating hard during his pre-practice session. Probably will be sooner than later for his return to game action, it just won't be tonight

Carolina Hurricanes projected lineup:

Tlusty - Staal - Semin
Gerbe - Staal - Dwyer
Skinner - Nash - Dvorak
Sutter - Lindholm - Bowman/Westgarth

Sekera-Faulk
Harrison-Murphy
Bellemore-Hainsey

Ward
Khudobin

As of right now it does not appear Ruutu or Gleason will be making their season debut.

Ron Francis is in Pittsburgh to take in the game.

Thanks for reading!

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