Three games, three wins in November for the Carolina Hurricanes. #ForgetOctober.
Tuesday night the Canes caught a Columbus team that is currently a bit down on their luck injury-wise, and the Canes capitalized. The recipe was similar to the two weekend wins in that the Canes jumped out to an early lead, rode a pretty consistent 60-minute effort and got strong goaltending from Cam Ward.
For the second consecutive game, the fourth line of Chris Terry-Victor Rask-Zach Boychuk notched the all-important first goal of the game when Terry went shoulder to shoulder to Jared Boll late in the third period. He lost the collision but then won the puck from down on the ice to Boychuk who got the puck to the point and went straight to the front of the net where he found a rebound and niftily went from forehand to backhand in one motion quickly getting the puck to the open part of the net before Curtis McElhinney could recover.
Terry did not register a point on the play though he played a huge part in it.
Otherwise the Canes were just better especially early in the game. At one point the Canes had about four times as many shots as Columbus. Goals by Riley Nash and later Justin Faulk shorthanded staked the Canes to a 3-1 lead in the third period, but a late goal by Nick Foligno made things tense down the stretch. But Cam Ward finished strong and the Canes survived to get the win that they earned.
A few player notes:
1) Riley Nash. He had one uncharacteristically bad play letting Foligno walk out past him from behind the end line to the front of the net to score, but otherwise he was very good again. To go with his regular strong skating and two-way play, he also had two incredibly good offensive plays. First, he intercepted a slap type pass and spun and shot it in one motion to score a goal. Then he went 90% Tarasenko dodging and weaving through a slew of Blue Jackets on the way to the net and drawing a penalty. Only a crazy finish kept it from being a 100% Tarasenko. He led Canes forwards in ice time which I am confident was by design, earned ice time and what Peters thought gave his team the best chance, not random coincidence.
2) The AHL line. Terry/Rask/Boychuk averaged about 15 1/2 minutes of ice time each. Before the season, I think you would have happily taken that trio holding their own and just staying out of trouble for eight-ish minutes per night. At this point, they might be the third line. They continue to be defensively responsible each and every shift and make simple/safe plays moving the puck forward. And along the way, they are opportunistically finding and converting offensive chances.
3) Cam Ward. For the full measure of a goalie requires three kinds of games. First, is the game when a goalie just plays lights out and is real good. I think he did that Saturday and to some degree Sunday as well. Second is the weird kind of game where you are not asked to be tremendous throughout, but there is that switch that gets flipped and you are suddenly and intensely put on the spot. That is what happened tonight. Ward was good and mistake-free throughout on his way to a fairly easy win when suddenly it was a 3-2 game, the pace was quickening and the Canes in front of him looked to be mostly just holding on. Ward rose to the occasion in the final 10 or so minutes when the team in front of him was a bit helter skelter and kept a mostly good effort from turning sour with 1 bad stretch in the third period. So the third kind of game I like to see is the kind where the goalie really just does not have his best stuff and seems to be fighting the puck a bit. In that game, can he will his way through it and put up a good enough effort for his team to at least get a point, or even better two, in the standings? Hopefully, he keeps playing well and we can push that challenge farther down the road.
4) Alexander Semin. The story of his return to the lineup was mostly a non-story. His game was okay (not great), and he seemed to mostly get the message about buying into the system and simplifying a bit. But the Alexander Semin story ranks about 8th on the list of stories from this game. Right now, the team is bigger than any individual and that is the story.
5) Justin Faulk. He turned things around abruptly after a slow start and continues to play well even notching a goal, shorthanded no less, on Tuesday.
6) Ice time. Sekera/Faulk were heavily used on defense which did not see balanced ice time, but the forward ice time was incredibly balanced. As noted above, the fourth line played third line type of minutes. No forward played more than 20 minutes. And no forward was under 11 minutes. Skinner (11:12) and Semin (12:28) were the 2 low men for forward ice time because frankly the other forwards are playing better than them right now, and Peters actions are matching his words for ice time.
Next up for the Canes is a rematch against Columbus at home in a game that could be chippy after some of the crap that happened in the 3rd period on Tuesday night including a dirty, leaping, late shoulder to head hit by Jack Johnson on Tlusty and an unnecessarily dangerous penalized hit by Gibbons on Nash sending Nash into the glass/boards at the end of the Columbus bench.
Twitter=@CarolinaMatt63 #ForgetOctober
Go Canes!