On Tuesday night Hurricanes managed to string together their first consecutive wins as they beat the San Jose Sharks 1-0 at the PNC Arena. Overall, this was probably one the Canes most complete games of the season to date.
Here are some of my thoughts from that game:
The TSA (Terravainen, Staal, Aho) line continued to look stellar and had some fantastic chances early. I think they were probably the best line for the Canes last night. They have played very well together and overall were finding ways to create chances almost on every shift. Terravainen looks like he has found some much needed confidence, as he took six shots in the first period alone. I don’t see Coach Peters splitting this line apart for a while.
Cam Ward earned his 24th career shutout and continued his superb play in the month of November. The most notable ones came in the first period during the Canes only PK of the night as Ward made a few one-timer and rebound saves to keep the game tied at zero. He also made three fantastic saves in the third period on deflections from shots at the points. This season, point shots that made it through traffic and/or were deflected have been an issue for the Canes in previous games. While he did give up a few large rebounds, the overall D zone coverage tied up bodies in front and allowed him to recover—something that they weren’t doing too well earlier in the season.
The D unit as a whole did a very strong job on gap control and minimizing the amount of speed the Sharks entered the zone with. They also did a really good job on controlling the puck and not making mistakes too. The Slavin and Pesce combination continues to get stronger—they both appear to be developing well into a top 4 role.
I was impressed with Tennyson—he did well in the defensive zone, but he also had some quality opportunities on offense. He had three shots in the first period that Dell absorbed, however, he was showing that he can get the puck to the net. The one critique was that it appears that he needed to keep the shots a bit lower. If he continues to be a good outlet on the point, I wouldn’t be surprised to see him staying in the line-up.
One line that appeared to begin causing problems around the second period for the Sharks was the newly constructed third line that consists of McGinn, Ryan and Stempniak. Stempniak was finding a lot of open ice and did a great job of creating space with the puck which resulted in some great scoring chances. He and McGinn looked really good together and had some nice passing sequences, zone entries and created an odd-man rush. McGinn continues to find ways to contribute positively and even saw time on the PK too.
The Canes fourth line really came alive in the third and it was spurned from the strong play of McClement. He was doing a great job of being physical on the fore-check and forcing some Shark turnovers. He had one great play early in the third when he won a puck battle behind the Sharks net and created a scoring opportunity but Dell made a fantastic save and the rebound was narrowly missed in what would have been an empty net tap-in.
Coach Peters talked about needing 18 guys to make positive contributions night in and night out a few weeks back. After making some roster changes, I think that he has found a strong balance for his top-6, as well as found how to get his bottom-6 involved too. The game-winner came from the fourth line in the third period as McClement found Nordstrom streaking into the zone—Nordstrom riffled a high shot that Dell stopped with his shoulder, however, Nordstrom followed up on his rebound and finished the play off with a great low shot.
So What Do the Canes Need: Wise people tend to believe that you learn from history to avoid repeating mistakes—as they say, history repeats itself. Canes fans can say what they want about Ward and his decline the past 2-3 seasons, but the fact of the matter is the Canes refusing to hire an adequate back-up prior to his injuries beginning around 2012-13 lockout season are what ultimately broke him.
If you look at his workload from the 2006-07 season through 2011-12, one would note he was one of the most heavily utilized goaltenders in the NHL. In fact, in the 2008-09 season from February until they were eliminated from the playoffs, he had one stretch in which he started 28 straight games; through their final 47 games (regular season and playoffs), Cam started 46 of those.
Beyond that, Ward had more saves (4152) in the 10-11 and 11-12 season than any other goaltenders total faced shots (he faced 4518)—seriously, think about that! As Jonathan Gardner noted in his article concerning overworking Ward, “To put it in another perspective, over the course of the 10-11 and 11-12 seasons, Cam Ward played in 28 games where he faced 40 or more shots. That is, far and away, the most in the league during that time span. More than Luongo (14), Price (10), Lundqvist (8), Miller (8), Quick (5), Rask (4) and Fleury (3). Even more impressive is that Ward’s record in those 28 games was 17-4-7.…
If the Canes want to take a stab at making the playoffs and also ensure that Cam Ward stays healthy, they need a backup who can play around 25-30 games and consistently give them a chance to win—Eddie Lack is not that guy. While he is a great locker-room guy and has a big personality, the experiment on bringing him in needs to end. In 34 games last season, he posted a 2.81 GAA with a .901 save percentage—this season through 5 games, he has a 3.78 GAA with a .856 save percentage. He has the second worst even strength save percentage in the NHL at .827, beating only Chris Driedger from Ottawa. It’s not to say he is a bad goalie, he just isn’t working out for the Canes—look at Dubnyk—he was traded 3 times and was on 4 teams in less than 2 seasons.
Personally, I think a reasonable and potentially achievable target would be either Jonathan Bernier or Scott Darling because they wouldn’t cost an arm and a leg. The Canes have an extra set of 2nd and 3rd round picks—I wouldn’t mind sending a 3rd and Eddie Lack for Bernier…I know some will point to Pittsburgh or Detroit, however, I feel the price would be overkill for a team that isn't guaranteed for a playoff run. So who would you bring in to help Ward out?