The Carolina Hurricanes returned home for a brief moment to say hello to the family and get a practice in before heading north to continue their road trip.
Tomorrow evening, the Hurricanes will travel to New York to take on the division rival Islanders at UBS Arena.
However, the team will be without one of their top point producers in Sebastian Aho.
Luckily for Aho, he will still be represented in the game as the Islanders have a defenseman named Sebastian Aho.
This is a big blow as Aho, the Hurricanes one, has been starting to really find his game.
A lower-body injury will keep him out of the lineup per Rod Brind’Amour. It does not appear to be a long-term injury but still keeps a key player out of an important divisional contest.
It appears that Paul Stastny will step into the Aho role for the short term.
Obviously, it is important to make sure that Aho is healthy and good to go for the long term. But this will be a great opportunity for Stastny to get going.
Stastny was brought to Carolina to provide some depth down the middle while producing some offense for the bottom lines.
Thus far the offense has not come at all.
With this opportunity, Stastny can play with more offensive minded players and be involved more in the offensive zone.
No doubt, Stastny’s job will remain the same by playing good two-way hockey, but it has been quite some time, if any with Carolina, that he has been around the net consistently.
The rotation of injuries keep going now that Teuvo Teravainen has returned but the opportunity may help the Hurricanes in the long run.