1. Do not let the Bruins keep the puck
The Carolina Hurricanes have to deny Boston the puck
Boston did anything they wanted except score five on five in the last two games. This is a testament to how good this Carolina Hurricanes defense is when it comes to stopping shots. But the Bruins have had plenty of shots in these games. Too many for comfort.
Game one saw them place 40 shots on goal. They followed that up with 35 in game two and 39 in game three. This is indicative of the fact that they keep generating offense and if it wasn’t for excellent goaltending from James Reimer and Petr Mrazek, these games could have gone much worse and the Bruins could have been looking at sweeping the series tonight.
Instead, the Carolina Hurricanes have a chance to tie up the series and set themselves on the path towards making the next series and the next. But that has to start by addressing the fact that the Bruins seem to have their way with the puck.
They are too comfortable with the puck. They can hold the offensive zone and do not rely on dump and chase to try and enter the zone. That has to change tonight. This team needs to do what they can to remove the puck from Boston players at any given time. They have to feel the pressure that Carolina has shown they can provide and force them to pass the puck.
The more the Bruins feel like they have to quickly move the puck, the more likely they will make a mistake and give it up. This can easily lead to odd-man rushes and high danger chances for Carolina.
But even when these chances are finally showing up this team needs to cleanly enter the zone and establish something they haven’t done very well in the first three games, and that is an offensive zone hold.