Carolina Hurricanes: Three Takeaways from Intense Game One Win

The Carolina Hurricanes once again, prove hockey analysts wrong. The Hurricanes defeat the New York Islanders in overtime in Game 1 in a battle of insane saves and stellar defensive performance of a 1-0 game. The Hurricanes have put momentum on their side with Game 2 on Sunday. What happened?

After a battle of endurance on Wednesday in Game 7 of the first round against the defending Stanley Cup champions, Washington Capitals, the Hurricanes once again shock the hockey world with yet another overtime win. In rest vs rust, each of the rested teams so far in round two has showed up rusted.

As with every game in the playoffs, fans will complain about referee calls and understandably in a close game like this. A few times in this game, the officiating was questionable, but compared to games in the first round, it wasn’t all that bad, and the officiating was actually decent making the calls that matter, the dangerous plays.

The Hurricanes took that game in double overtime and they take this one in a single overtime. Jordan Staal with the great shot off of Robin Lehner’s skate and in.

Unlike the series with the Washington Capitals, the Carolina Hurricanes take the needed road win early this round, as early as Game 1. If the Hurricanes take all three of their home games with a win again like last round, they will move onto the Eastern Conference Finals. If not, they’ll need another combination that includes some road wins. What world are we living in again?

The Hurricanes have won three games in a row and they are rolling off of dethroning the champions and getting the win in Game 1 against the Islanders. At this pace, they can end this series early. What went right and what went wrong in Game 1? Here are your takeaways:

1. Penalty-Kill Good, Power-Play Not So Good

The Carolina Hurricanes killed off every penalty they took in this game. They took five minor penalties and the Islanders being on the power-play four times and a 4-on-4 for two minutes as well. Jordan Staal took two penalties and they were stilled killed off without one of this team’s major penalty-killing centers. In Game 7 of the first round, they also killed off every penalty and tallied a shorthanded goal.

As noted in the Keys to Game 1, the Islanders like to play a cycling offensive game, especially on the powerplay. The Hurricanes have played well against the mechanics of the Islanders powerplay and make the possession time of the Islanders very limited and they do not give them lots of time to think, forcing turnovers and even shorthanded rushes.

This penalty-kill has proven to be deadly many times so far in the playoffs and it’s always improving.

The penalty-kill is excellent, in fact perfect in this game and the last. The powerplay, however, is not good, and the last time they scored anything near a powerplay goal is in Game 6 of the first round with Warren Foegele scoring seconds after the powerplay ends, technically still a man up.

In Game 7 of the first round, they scored more shorthanded goals than they did powerplay goals, one to none. In Game 1 against the Islanders, they scored zero goals on the powerplay on four of their opportunities.

Although, it may seem the Hurricanes have found alternatives to make up for their abysmal powerplay, with five-on-five and penalty-kill performances, if the powerplay was good as well, they could win future games that rely on one or a few more goals, they can build offensive momentum, that is needed against this stellar Islanders defensive core.

Perhaps Rod Brind’Amour needs to change up the powerplay units or the players on those units currently just need to change the way they approach the powerplay.

2. Defense Stands Tall

Although the defensive play of the Hurricanes was not at all perfect in this game, it was satisfactory, it was enough to get the win, and it was enough for a competent offensive performance to take the win in overtime. The Hurricanes dominated in defensive play in basically the first half of the first period and for multiple shifts in the other periods.

When Petr Mrazek would give up a bad rebound or face a flurry of shots in the slot, the Hurricanes defense would quickly force their way to the puck and flip it into the neutral zone to get quick line changes and give Mrazek backup. That is the teamwork and the intelligent plays that are required from this team and they delivered in Game 1.

The Hurricanes blue line has continued to contribute offensively, as they have all season and in the playoffs. The transitioning and rotation of forwards and defensemen on this team has been impressive. If a defenseman pinches, a forward plays back, and it has paid off. The Islanders were not able to force that many odd-man rushes due to the effort this team has in back-checking and defensive awareness in the event of an offensive zone turnover.

The Hurricanes play such a tight neutral-zone trap that the Islanders just can’t seem to force their way and have to resort to dumping and chasing. Which actually isn’t that inefficient for the Islanders as they have their forwards play tight to the boards and lots of space down the middle where they dump it off the corner to retrieve on the other side, rather than dumping it all the way around the boards.

The Hurricanes neutral-zone trap is efficient and battling the Islanders dumping and chasing strategy off the corner should be the next step to shutting down the Islanders’ forwards.