Carolina Hurricanes: Three Takeaways From the Loss To Washington

The Carolina Hurricanes lost a 3-2 game against Washington

The Carolina Hurricanes dropped their one and only exhibition game yesterday afternoon against the Washington Capitals. Here are the takeaways from the loss.

Hockey in July. For the first and hopefully last time in Carolina Hurricanes history the puck dropped for an exhibition game between the Canes and Capitals in Toronto. It was a historic match-up between two division rivals in a game with zero implications. Somehow it seems as if these two teams missed the memo.

This was probably a very good preview for what could be a promising first-round series, granted we get past The New York Rangers next week. The level of play and competition was a bit higher than expected for an exhibition game with no real-world implications and the final score, while disappointing, reflected a game that was played to its full extent.

If you felt that the effort yesterday wasn’t what you wanted to see from the Carolina Hurricanes, you aren’t alone. Coach Rod Brind’amour did not mince words when describing what he saw and where his expectations are moving forward with this team:

"“I didn’t like too much, to be honest with you. I thought the third period was a little better. We started, I felt like, getting to more what our game should look like.” “I expected to be rusty, and we saw that in the first, really, two periods. That concerns a little, but I liked the fact that it looked like by the third we got our legs. … Overall, I think it’s just good to get the rust off. We’ll have some good teaching clips for tomorrow, and hopefully the rust is off as we move on.”"

But before we move on, let’s take some of the good takeaways from the game as well and hopefully build on them as we prepare for the New York Rangers.