The Carolina Hurricanes got shutout by the Los Angeles Kings on Friday night. Here are some takeaways from the one-sided affair.
The trip out West was not kind to the Carolina Hurricanes on Friday as they got shutout by the Los Angeles Kings by a final score of 3-0.
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Getting shots on net was not an issue for Carolina. They peppered Jonathan Quick with 40 shots on goal, but unfortunately, very few of them were of high quality.
Offense was the most obvious issue for the Hurricanes, and it has been a pattern for years. Until it is fixed, we can expect the same outcome from this team. They will look to turn things around against the San Jose Sharks on Saturday night.
Here are some takeaways from Friday night’s shutout loss to the Kings.
1. Defensive miscues are still game changing.
The output from Carolina’s offense continues to be the most glaring issue, but mind lapses in their own zone continue to be an underlying problem for the Canes.
Tyler Toffoli gave the Kings a 1-0 lead in the first period on the powerplay, but it could have been avoided with proper defensive zone coverage.
Christian Ehrhoff gets the puck at point, and the Canes penalty kill coverage makes a tough mistake. Victor Rask and Jay McClement were the penalty killing forwards on the play, and instead of splitting up and covering the wide open Toffoli on the right wing, they both attack Ehrhoff at the point.
Only one of them need to attack the point, and it should be Victor Rask in this situation. McClement needed to stay on Toffoli, but instead, he is left wide open, and was able to send a slap shot past Cam Ward. This would be the eventual game winning goal. By the time McClement was able to recover, Toffoli was well on his way to making it a 1-0 game.
It was a 2-0 game late in the third period, and the Canes had an outside shot of making this a close game until an unfortunate mistake iced it away.
The Carolina Hurricanes had some established zone time late in the third period, but the Kings got the puck and were breaking out. Lucic carried the puck up the left wing, and Noah Hanifin had a decision to make.
Hanifin can either pinch and risk allowing a 2-on-1 going the other way, or he can drop back and likely eliminate a scoring chance.
Hanifin decides to pitch at a bad time, and Lucic is able to easily make a pass to Toffoli and then spring right past the rookie defenseman to create a 2-on-1 against Ryan Murphy, the only man back for the Hurricanes.
The mistakes don’t stop there for the Hurricanes defense.
After Lucic gets the puck to Toffoli, which springs the 2-on-1, Toffoli gives it back to Lucic and drives the net.
Instead of playing the pass on the 2-on-1, Murphy goes for the man. As a defenseman, it’s important to play the pass on a 2-on-1 so that the goalie can just worry about the shooter. Murphy gets aggressive with a much bigger, stronger player in Lucic, and it doesn’t work.
Lucic is able to physically overpower Murphy and get around him, which sets up the open pass to Toffoli. That is why playing the shooter on the 2-on-1 is so dangerous. If you mess up, it can create an easy pass to the other man, or it can potentially even create a 2-on-0 breakaway. Here, it creates an easy one-time opportunity for Toffoli, a man that scored earlier in the game and has scored goals in 4 straight games.
He is going to score that goal ten out of ten times.
The Carolina Hurricanes will not win games when they don’t score, but they also won’t win games until these tough mental breakdowns stop occurring defensively.
2. Cam Ward is not the problem.
Among all the issues that the Carolina Hurricanes have right now, Cam Ward is not one of them.
The horrible mistakes in front of him are giving opponents open chances, and they are NHLers, which means they will likely take advantage of Carolina’s miscues.
The lack of offense isn’t helping either. The Hurricanes have averaged 1.83 goals per game in front of their long-time back stop in 6 games this season. That will not win you games in the NHL, no matter how good your goalie is.
3. John-Michael Liles continues to impress.
From the beginning of the season, veteran blue liner John-Michael Liles has done the little things that make teams good.
Liles gives up his body to block shots, he makes smart decisions both with and without the puck, and he is surprisingly physical considering his 5’10”, 185 pound frame. He has also been paired with Michal Jordan, a player that has woefully disappointed most Canes fans since stepping in to replace James Wisniewski.
He doesn’t tend to get the spotlight, but John-Michael Liles is a man playing for a new contract. If he keeps up this level of play and consistency, he will get one.