With a "hold on for dear life and catch a break late" OTL point on Saturday in Boston and a good 4-1 win at home against Ottawa on Sunday, the Canes salvaged a week you can live with at 1-2-1 against strong competition. The win in the 24th game of the season marked the 1st time that the Canes have won by more than 1 goal.
The game also marks the beginning of a slightly more reasonable stretch of opponents. Schedule can sometimes be overrated. When teams are playing well, they find ways to win regardless of opponent, injuries, etc. But the gauntlet that the Canes played through in their 1st 23 games was the hardest schedule in the NHL to start the season. Next up, the Canes see a regular helping of teams fairly similar to them record-wise starting with Ottawa, continuing with 2 against New Jersey and generally see more of a mix of opponent talent through December.
With the team getting healthier, could the stretch of reasonable schedule be the stretch where the Canes climb above .500? Or is this just another mini-upswing on the constant up and down rollercoaster? It is exactly this drama that wears us Canes fans down but also makes it worth tuning in for.
Sunday's game did not go according to script. With slightly more favorable play/travel times on Saturday and playing at home, the hope was that the Canes would come out fresher and be able to tilt the ice early. It was exactly the opposite. Only strong play by Ward and a little luck enabled the Canes to survive the Sens' initial siege that lasted about 10 minutes. But sometime shortly after the midway point of the 1st period, the Canes got their legs under them and were the better team for the next stretch of play quickly opening up a 2-goal lead early in the 2nd period and then playing a pretty solid game with the lead for the rest of it.
One of the most striking things about this game was how different the Canes looked playing with a lead which was rare this week. In a scenario in which the team did not need to score, it could focus on being steady defensively and opportunistically taking offensive shots when they arose. The result was a pretty solid 2nd half of the game defensively that saw good play by Ward but did not require him to stand on his head as he did early. And the team actually generated a reasonable number of offensive chances despite sitting back a bit and not taking many risks.
A few player notes:
--Eric Staal. It took an empty-netter to get his score sheet up to an impressive total, but even before that this was his best game this season. He has had fits of good play but nothing like Sunday where he strung together 60 minutes of strong play in all 3 zones.
--Cam Ward. At the beginning of the week, I questioned whether there would be a price to pay in the standings while Ward shook the rust off after a long layoff. This transition is going far better than anyone could have hoped. He looked a little rusty early in the Monday Boston game, obviously did not play at Detroit, but has now been incredibly good in the 2 games since. His play in the 1st period were the single greatest contribution to this win. This game becomes much more challenging if the Sens get 2 or even 3 during their early surge and then become the team that can sit back a bit. Instead the Canes via Cam Ward weathered the early storm and became the team playing with a lead soon thereafter.
--Justin Faulk. He has struggled a bit of late and had a very good bounce back game Sunday night having a good night defensively and also notching a couple scoring points.
--Elias Lindholm. In my long lineup-focused blog this week, I called out the C3 slot as 1 of the unsettled spots in the roster. Nash has been sound defensively in this role but just does not bring enough offense to this slot in the scenario in which the Canes go with a 2A and 2B approach to line building that builds a defense-focused line around Jordan Staal and an matchup/scoring-focused line around Jeff Skinner. When he was drafted, the hope was that he was advanced enough that he would be able to step straight into this C3 slot and provide solid 2-way play with some offense. After some struggles adjusting and with injuries and a reset with a bunch of ice time in Charlotte, he is back to audition again. Past him I think the plan is maybe a Rask audition and minus any success with those 2 options, I think Rutherford is forced to look outside the organization to fill this role that is key to balancing the offense. So where I am going is that I am watching very closely for an offensive uptick from Lindholm in round 2. His goal today was on the power play not even strength, but it is a start.
--Tuomo Ruutu. He is mostly filling in for Semin on EStaal's line right now, but he could ultimately be the other key piece to building that 3rd line that can score like a 2nd line and make the Canes deep if not overpowering offensively. Ideal would be for him to ride EStaal's rising and coattails a bit to build momentum for an eventual return to provide some size and physical play to complement Skinner/Lindholm. So his goal was big in the context of the individual game obviously, but with 2 this week just maybe his game is finally rounding into form. On that note, perhaps the better measure of where he is now is his 6 shots on goal Sunday
Next up is a pair of games against New Jersey bookending the US Thanksgiving holiday. A couple wins would see the Canes seize the #4 spot in the Metro and push the Rangers for #3 and the guaranteed playoff slot.
Twitter=@CarolinaMatt63
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