Carolina Hurricanes: Keys to Sweeping the Detroit Red Wings
The Carolina Hurricanes finish up their two game road trip tonight in Detroit as they look to sweep the Red Wings in this middle of the season miniseries. If the Canes can manage to pull out a win tonight, they’ll be looking at a 9-game winning streak.
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For starters, tonight’s matchup will see no lineup changes for the Carolina Hurricanes, aside from in the crease; James Reimer gets the call to the starter’s crease this evening in place of Alex Nedeljkovic.
This is normal at this point. Rod Brind’amour has been alternating between the two in Petr Mrazek‘s absence, and I’d expect this trend to continue until Mrazek returns from injury.
Red Wings forward Bobby Ryan will miss tonight’s game with an upper-body injury, and none other than Evgeny Svechnikov is being called from the taxi squad to take his place. Looks like we’ll finally be getting Svech Bowl 2.0 tonight, folks.
We should expect more of the same from both teams tonight, but there are still a few things for the Carolina Hurricanes to keep in mind.
3. No Pressure
Sometimes, having a long winning streak can tend to put pressure on teams to keep it going, and this in turn can oftentimes cause a team to stumble and make more mistakes than they normally would.
The Carolina Hurricanes are going to have to battle past that if that is indeed something that they are experiencing at this point.
An 8-game winning streak is nothing to laugh at, and of course we’d all love to see it extended to 9, but the Canes can’t let the pressure of continuing a winning streak get in the way of winning a game against a very beatable opponent.
I’m sure the Canes are more than equipped to do so, but we may eventually see this pressure start to weigh on them in the near future. It’s just another obstacle for this already adversity-hardened team to overcome. If any team in the league can do it, it’s the Carolina Hurricanes.
2. More Rookie Dominance
You guys have definitely already read these words from me, but the Carolina Hurricanes’ rookies are huge standouts so far this season.
Between Morgan Geekie, Steven Lorentz, and Jake Bean, not a single one of these guys looks like they belong anywhere but an NHL roster.
Geekie has been offensively dominant since returning to the Canes’ roster, Lorentz has been a huge physical two-way presence, and Bean has been instrumental in the Canes’ 2nd powerplay unit and has looked just fantastic lining up next to Haydn Fleury every night.
There is no doubt at this point that the contributions of these rookies have been a huge key in the Canes’ continued success this season, and all three of them will almost certainly continue this trend going forward.
1. Special Teams Supremacy
Contrary to previous seasons, the Carolina Hurricanes’ special teams units have been absolutely stellar this season.
The Canes currently boast the best powerplay in the league at 31.8% and the 9th best penalty kill in the league at 82.8%.
Players like Vincent Trocheck, Jordan Staal, and Dougie Hamilton have been studs on both the powerplay and the penalty kill, giving the Canes an edge on both sides of the man advantage.
Special teams consistency is another one of those ‘hidden ingredients’ that every cup contending team needs to retain their status as such, and the Carolina Hurricanes have just so happened to have found that in droves this season.
It’s looking more and more likely that the Canes are finally going to make a real push for the Stanley Cup this season; if they keep up this trajectory, there’s no reason to believe otherwise.
Game Notes
Location: Little Caesars Arena
Puck Drop: 7:30PM EST
TV: Fox Sports Carolinas
Radio: 99.9 The Fan
Uniforms: White Aways
Projected Lineup:
- Niederreiter – Aho – Necas
- Svechnikov – Staal – Fast
- McGinn – Martinook – Foegele
- Paquette – Geekie – Lorentz
- Slavin – Hamilton
- Skjei – Pesce
- Fleury – Bean
Projected Goalie Matchup:
Carolina: James Reimer, 12-3-0, .908 SV%, 2.71 GAA
Detroit: Jonathan Bernier, 7-6-0, .912 SV%, 2.96 GAA
Score Prediction:
109. 2. 72. Prediction. 5
Trending. Nedeljkovic Deserves the Backup Spot. light