Power Play: Hurricanes can't capitalize on early momentum, fall 2-1 to Ducks
RALEIGH, N.C. -- The Carolina Hurricanes (19-27-7) hadn't played at home for 13 days and hadn't played anyone for five days, but rust didn't settle in until late in the game against the Anaheim Ducks (35-14-7) in a 2-1 loss. After a scoreless first, the Hurricanes took a 1-0 lead about halfway through the second before the Ducks scored two goals in two minutes, 52 seconds later in the period to answer.
1. A tale of two halves
Yes, hockey is divided up into three periods. But in this game, you could chop it almost exactly in half to see when the Hurricanes were playing well and when it went off the rails.
After a long layoff, it would have seemed logical that the lull would have happened early. Instead, the Hurricanes were the more active team at the start and head coach Bill Peters has been stressing that.
About halfway through the second period though things started to get a bit hairy for the Hurricanes and a few minutes later, a 1-0 lead turned into a 2-1 deficit in a little less than three minutes.
At one point in the second, the Hurricanes were out-shooting the Ducks 27-9. The final tally was just 36-17, because after the Ducks got the 2-1 lead, they really started to clamp down defensively.
Still, Peters thought the advantage in shots early -- and on the final stat sheet -- was a bit misleading.
"We had a good start, obviously, but a little false sense of security offensively. I didn't think we were dangerous. I didn't think we were on the inside, especially in the third," Peters said. "We just looked at all our chances and there isn't a Grade A in the third, so that's disappointing. I thought we had good pace to our game, we had good puck speed early, but then the puck speed went away and then we started to play slow."
Peters said that he wants his team to move the puck more via the pass than skating with it, since obviously a pass gets it where it needs to be faster than the other way around. The Hurricanes finished with 10 giveaways, and seven of them came in the third as they were trying to create scoring chances.
"I just didn't think we executed passing the puck as well in the second half. Our execution level as far as moving the pucks out of our end and through the neutral zone just wasn't as good," captain Eric Staal said. "Thus, they didn't have to score any more goals. They just made it a simple game. We weren't able to scrape one there at the end."
"We've got to bear down and finish on our chances," Jeff Skinner, who scored the Hurricanes' only goal in the second, said. "There's a little lull in our game, I think, in the beginning or middle part of the third. In the end, we picked it up and had some good chances -- we just couldn't get that second one."
2. For the first time in awhile, it seemed like the Hurricanes took a step back -- even just a small one
"I thought from the fight on, we weren't very good," Peters said. "I don't know what happened there but to me, that's when the game changed a little bit, for whatever reason. I didn't think we played with the same pace and intensity from that point on."
It doesn't make a whole lot of sense, but then again, neither does a well-rested team coming out with energy early only to lose their resilience and bounce in the second.
"We were ready to go. We were well-rested. I thought our jump was good. We went after them. You want to be rewarded with a couple goals, but we had enough offensive chances to score, we just didn't score," Staal said.
"That can be frustrating, but we built a 1-0 lead and you want to build off that and go from there. But two breakdowns ended up in the back of our net, and then I thought we just didn't move the puck as well the rest of the way."
Peters complimented the work of guys that were able to get shots -- 36 is a lot -- but he said his team didn't execute well enough offensively in terms of turning those shots into chances. So that number felt empty, even early on in the game before the Ducks took control.
"Now, when we're getting those shots, we need somebody in front of the goaltender. It felt like a game earlier in the year, some of those games that were 2-1 games where we had some shots, but no chances. That's what it felt like to me," Peters said.
That's certainly not what you want from a team that is likely not going to the playoffs but one that is growing up together and showing what they could be more consistently next year (albeit with probably slightly different pieces). They're 9-3-3 in 2015 in spite of being, overall-record wise, one of the worst teams in the NHL.
This stretch they've been on in 2015 has been good for the younger guys in terms of learning to play with some confidence, though, and seeing what it takes to have success. So they can't revert.
"It's nice when you can play with a little bit of confidence out there. A nice part about that is that everyone has been contributing," Skinner said of this good stretch. "It's been a true team effort, I think. Guys have been playing well off of each other and obviously the goaltending has been great all year for us. We've been finding ways to get in some goals and hopefully we can keep building off of those good things."
3. Jeff Skinner finally got going
The Hurricanes haven't been winning games in 2015 by riding one player's hot streak, but rather with team hockey. Still, it was discouraging on some level to see a goal-scorer like Jeff Skinner struggle to get going.
He broke through finally in the second with the Hurricanes only goal on the power play, and it was his first goal since January 10.
"Yeah, it's a little frustrating when you can't seem to get one there but it's a great pass by (John-Michael Liles) there and a nice little bounce off the goalie's shoulder, but I'll take that right now," Skinner said.
Skinner has had a number of concussions and has at times this season appeared to play a bit tentatively. That wasn't the case in this one, and it was something his teammates were happy to see.
"He was moving pretty well I thought in the first half and was really attacking and getting shots to the net, and that's his game," Staal said. "When he's doing that, getting in the dirty areas, getting in the traffic areas, that's key. He was rewarded with a good goal."
Jeff Skinner -- He attempted a game-high seven shots in 16:53 of ice time and gave out three hits and had two takeaways, really -- as his teammates said -- doing the kind of dirty work to find offensive success that the team doesn't always see out of him.
Jiri Tlusty -- He had five shots in just 19:02 of ice time and was active, doing his best to try to create something in the third (he had all five of his attempts in the third), adding a hit and a takeaway.
Justin Faulk -- The Hurricanes young defenseman led all players with five hits given, and he added four takeaways and a blocked shot as well. He only attempted two shots, but he did his job on the defensive end in a game where the Hurricanes couldn't seem to get much going on the other end towards the end of the game.
