Hurricanes Week-In-Review: September 22-28
By Brian Watson
First Training Camp Cuts: GM Ron Francis announced Monday morning that the Hurricanes sent seven players back to their respective junior teams, leaving 44 players to compete for a roster spot. Forwards Clark Bishop, Brent Pedersen, and Sergey Tolchinsky; defensemen Tyler Ganly, Kyle Jenkins, Josh Wesley; and goaltender Alex Nedeljkovic will all start the 2014-15 season with their junior teams. Tolchinsky tallied an assist in the Hurricanes’ first preseason game against the Columbus Blue Jackets, while Nedeljkovic stopped 5 out of 6 shots in the same game.
Game Recap – 9/23 at Buffalo: Two days after losing their first preseason game, the ‘Canes traveled to Buffalo, NY to take on the Sabres. For the second straight game the Hurricanes failed to come out on top, being shutout 2-0 by Buffalo. With the exception of Riley Nash and John-Michael Liles, everyone else on the Hurricanes roster played in their first preseason game of the year. With each goaltender playing half of the game, Anton Khudobin stopped all nine shots he faced, while backup Drew MacIntyre allowed two goals on 12 shots. Coach Bill Peters had high praise for Victor Rask who won 11 out of 16 faceoffs in the game. The ‘Canes will be without Jordan Staal for the forseeable future, as he broke a bone in his right leg after getting tangled up with Sabres defenseman Josh Gorges in the third period.
Game Recap – 9/24 at NY Islanders: The second of back-to-back games had the ‘Canes playing in Nassau Coliseum against the New York Islanders. Assistant coach Rod Brind’Amour continues to prove that his newly-implemented system for the team’s powerplay is working. The Hurricanes went 3-for-6 in the game with powerplay goals coming from Ryan Murphy, Jeff Skinner, and Andrej Sekera. The team carried a 2-0 lead into the third period, where they scored the third of the powerplay goals just over three minutes into the period. The Islanders followed with a shorthanded goal just ten seconds later. Each team had a late goal in the period with the final score being 4-2 in favor of the Hurricanes. Originally, Drew MacIntyre was supposed to start the game with Anton Khudobin replacing him halfway through the second period, but head coach Bill Peters allowed MacIntyre to finish the game after his strong play through two periods of play.
Red vs. White Scrimmage Recap: The Hurricanes held their annual Caniac Carnival on Friday, and following the festivities the remaining players at training camp were divided into two squads for the Red vs. White Scrimmage. The scrimmage differed from a real NHL game slightly. The coaches had set times during the periods for 4-on-4, powerplays, and penalty kills, in addition to two shootouts. Brock McGinn had a beautiful top-shelf goal in the first frame, which was following by one of the shootouts. Alex Semin and Eric Staal scored on Anton Khudobin while Jay McClement put one past Cam Ward. Staal was also able to score on one of the planned two-man advantages in the second period. Daniel Altshuller was unable to stop Jeff Skinner and Nathan Gerbe as they both put their talents on display with two beautiful goals. The final score was eventually 5-4 in favor of the red squad.
Second Round of Training Camp Cuts: On Saturday, GM Ron Francis announced nine players were being assigned to the Hurricanes’ minor league affiliate, the Charlotte Checkers. Defensemen Trevor Carrick, Dennis Robertson and Keegan Lowe; forwards Ben Holmstrom, Justin Shugg, Greg Nemisz, Kyle Hagel, and Jared Staal; and goaltender Daniel Altshuller were the second group of players cut from training camp. The Hurricanes also announced that forward Chad LaRose had joined the team on a professional tryout contract and will report to training camp immediately. LaRose signed an AHL deal with the Checkers this offseason. The roster of players remaining now stands at 36.
Josh Wesley Scores Impossible Goal: On Saturday this happened…
Injury Report:
- Jordan Staal (leg) – out 3-4 months
Preseason Team Stats:
[table id=28 /]
Preseason Team Leaders (only players remaining on training camp roster):
[table id=29 /]