Carolina Hurricanes Blank the Red Wings to Open the Season

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Jan 14, 2021; Detroit, Michigan, USA; Carolina Hurricanes right wing Nino Niederreiter (21) skates with the puck defended by Detroit Red Wings defenseman Patrik Nemeth (22) in the third period at Little Caesars Arena. Mandatory Credit: Rick Osentoski-USA TODAY Sports /

Contributions from The Guys that Struggled Last Year

The game-winning goal of the night belongs to Nino Niederreiter, who struggled to buy a goal last season only scoring 11 in 67 games played. Considering he took 115 shots in that campaign, it wasn’t for a lack of trying.

This year he tried something a little different right out of the gate. He showed some patience with the puck, recognized that the Red Wings were just going to all watch him for 5 seconds, and completely embarrassed Thomas Greiss to score the only goal needed to win the game.

https://twitter.com/Canes/status/1349923012984889345

It was good to see Nino start his year off strong. Sebastian Aho also got a point on that play to start his campaign for points this season.

But that seemed to be the only scoring happening all game. It came only 3:38 into the first period and then we got nothing but crickets for the next 53:48 of the game as both netminders decided to have a little duel, which was heavily tilted at the Red Wings end of the ice.

But then with only 2:34 left in the game, Ryan Dzingel does something that seemed nearly impossible last season. He scored on the power play.

Now Ryan isn’t a stranger to powerplay goals. He had four of them last year in the 64 games he suited up for. But considering those were mostly early in the season and accounted for half his goal totals last year, this one was worth its weight in gold.

Just as a five-on-three opportunity expires and Jake Gardiner lofts a heavy shot at the net from the blue line that Ryan finds with his stick and redirects it cleanly behind Griess. Martin Necas who moved the puck over to Jake also secured his first point of the season.

It also shut the door on the Red Wings who thought they had a whisper of hope to get back into this game and at least salvage a point out of it. Turns out that was just the noise that Peter’s glove makes as he continues to steal their dreams away.

Also of note is the fact that Teuvo Teravainen earned an assist on the empty netter by Svechnikov making him one of the seven Hurricanes currently on a point per game pace.

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