On Wednesday, the Carolina Hurricanes sent Tuomo Ruutu packing. On Saturday, they arrived in New Jersey to give him his going away present. To be clear, Ruutu obviously earned everything he received just as he did when wearing a Canes uniform. But his game-winning goal, 2-point, 1st-star effort on Saturday was probably he needed to complete the transition, make his 1st big contributions to a new team and get back to playing hockey minus the overhead of the life change. While a different team quickly picking up the "Ruuuuu" chants hurt a little, I was happy for him. I am on record as wishing him nothing but the best, and I meant it. And right now, losing is unfortunately a big contribution to the Canes getting back to the playoffs not this year, but 1 can always hope for next.
A few quick comments on the game:
--Ryan Murphy. He logged 26:51 of ice time. I would expect more of the same the rest of the season as the Canes try to fast forward his development. His game was imperfect but more positive than negative.
--Nathan Gerbe. The consistency of his effort and compete level continues to be impressive. It is to the point, where I rarely say anything along the lines of "Nathan Gerbe played incredibly hard tonight" simply because it is just how it always is. In an ideal world, he will get pushed a little farther down the depth chart next season, but I think he is definitely a part of the mix with his consistently high compete level and secondary scoring ability.
--Alexander Semin. Despite the down times as a Canes fan, the team has mustered 2 highlight reel goals in only 6 days. Andrej Sekera did the honors against Anaheim on Sunday, and Alexander Semin did it today with his spin-o-rama with 4 defenders on the screen. And if you missed it last night, go hunt down the Sergey Tolchinsky (Canes prospect in juniors) goal from last night.
--Jordan Staal. He had a strong game with and chasing down the puck and netted 2 assists as a reward.
--Bojangles? No way. The power play managed to yield another shorthanded goal. That is an abysmal 5 in 6 games. But with a Jay Harrison goal, Canes fans of Boberry biscuits have there 1st chance for free ones since, since...I can't remember.
--Cam Ward. He was high glove again (think everyone has that book by now), but he did manage to get through more than a period of hockey, allow only 1 goal in the process and made some good saves along the way. Count it as a baby step in the right direction.
--Jeff Skinner. He had another good game offensively. Ironically, his goal was more of a weird play than his usual dynamic play, but it was a fair reward from the hockey gods after a decent collection of other plays that could have netted a more typical goal. This said, I just do not see him getting any closer to being a player that you can play regularly in your top 6 where you need players who can play both sides of the puck. He just continues to struggle too much without the puck and in his own end.
I am not proud or happy to admit it, but the 1st team I checked on the NHL scoreboard was Nashville who sits at 62 points (versus Carolina's 63) and is probably the last team that the Canes could catch moving down in the standings and up the draft order to get to #6.
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