Carolina Hurricanes: Revisiting Eddie Lack’s Tenure

His Tenure with the Carolina Hurricanes

Good to note, Eddie Lack signed a two-year extension before the 2015-2016 season for $5.5 million that lasted until 2018. Lack had some regression after a litany of injuries that caused his stats to take a decent hit. In the 2015-2016 season, behind Cam Ward, Lack started 31 games, played in 34, with a record of 12-14-6 with a 2.81 GAA and a .901% save percentage. 2016-2017 was also not a great year for Eddie Lack, in which he played 20 games, started in 18, and put up a record of 8-7-3 with a 2.64 GAA and a .902% save percentage.

During this time, Eddie would also be the star actor in the infamous Lacko Taco commercial for Gonza Tacos y Tequila in Raleigh. This honestly isn’t incredibly noteworthy, but the amount of times I have personally seen this commercial is immense. I would honestly call this (and the Justin Faulk Moe’s commercial) the Marley Drug commercial before Marley Drug even thought of having a commercial during Carolina Hurricanes hockey games.

After the 2016-2017 season, nearly 2 years to the day of his last trade, Eddie Lack was once again traded, this time to the Calgary Flames. The Carolina Hurricanes traded Lack, alongside former first-round pick Ryan Murphy and a 2019 7th round pick for Keegan Kanzig and a 2019 6th round pick. As this article is mainly an excuse to have some trade trees, let’s start with the Flames side first.

Ryan Murphy was waived the following day for the purpose of buying out the last year of his contract. He then signed a two-way deal with the Minnesota Wild. He never really stuck with an NHL team and mainly played in the AHL until 2019, where he would sign with HC Neftekhimik Nizhnekamsk of the KHL. In 2020, he signed with the Henderson Silver Knights of the AHL, where he has 27 points in 37 games.

Now, the Calgary Flames got immense value out of that 2019 7th round pick, selecting Dustin Wolf 214th overall. Wolf has been the starting goalie of the Everett Silvertips in the WHL since the 2018-2019 season, and has never had a season with a GAA above 2.30 and a save percentage below a .928%. In this year, he played 22 games for Everett, putting up a 1.80 GAA and a .940% save percentage.

Eddie Lack played 4 games for the Calgary Flames, putting up a 1-2-0 record with a horrid 5.29 GAA and a .813% save percentage. He was traded to the New Jersey Devils in December of 2017, where he played another 4 games, putting up a 1-2-0 record with a 3.18 GAA and a .903% save percentage. Lack never played a game for the Devils during the 2018-2019 season, playing 6 AHL games with the Binghamton Devils. He underwent hip surgery in December of 2018 and retired in 2020.

The Carolina Hurricanes side of things isn’t as interesting. Keegan Kanzig never grew into the third round pick he was drafted with, as he never put up more than 20 points in a season in the WHL. But, he was a enforcer defenseman listed at 6’7 who once had 159 penalty minutes in 70 games in the WHL. Kanzig wasn’t re-signed by the Carolina Hurricanes and is now playing AHL hockey with the San Diego Gulls.

The 2019 6th round pick is a little more interesting, as the Carolina Hurricanes selected Kevin Wall 181st overall. In Wall’s draft year, he had 31 goals as part of 64 points in 49 games with the Chilliwack Chiefs of the BCHL. He then committed to Sara Civian’s favorite Big 10 college hockey team, the Penn State Nittany Lions, where in his freshman year, Wall had 2 goals and 7 points in 26 games playing minimal minutes.

Wall’s sophomore year saw his role expand, as he’d become a much larger part of the Penn State offense. Kevin Wall had 8 goals and 19 points in 22 games playing mainly top line minutes for a Penn State team that unfortunately lost in the semi-finals to a Cole Caufield-led Wisconsin team. Wall is expected to have a big year for the Nittany Lions in his junior year when that gets underway in late 2021.

In conclusion, Eddie Lack came to Raleigh, was a name on the list of Cam Ward’s backups but was a fan favorite partly because of his play and partly because of his off-ice demeanor and candor that still continues on Twitter to this day. His departure in 2017 gave the Carolina Hurricanes lasting value for the future and he is still well liked by Canes fans after his departure, which is more than one former 2nd line center that currently plays for the Nashville Predators can say.