For the second season in a row, the Carolina Hurricanes and the New York Islanders found themselves on a collision course in the first round in 2024. The Canes, who finished second in the division with 111 points, defeated the Islanders in six games in 2023 on their way to a conference finals appearance. A year later, they sought a familiar result against their division foe.
There was a clear gap between the Rangers and Hurricanes and the rest of the division. The Islanders, who finished third in the Metro in 2023-24, were 17 points back of the Canes for the second spot. They'd only won 39 games, the fewest of the eight playoff teams in the East, and benefited from 16 overtime and shootout losses, tied for the most in the league.
To make matters worse, they were far from the defensive juggernaut that they'd been in recent years. They finished tied for 18th in goals against after regularly sitting in the Top 10. While Ilya Sorokin had been their starter for most of the campaign, Patrick Roy, who'd taken over midway through the year, rode the hot hand of Semyon Varlamov after a strong finish to his season.
#12: Exciting spurts helped the Canes down the Islanders again
The Hurricanes' power play struck early in Game 1 to get it started. Evgeny Kuznetsov used a moving screen and pinpoint accuracy to snap his shot over Varlamov's shoulder from a tough angle. The Islanders' fourth line got it back before the midway point. Kyle MacLean's persistence after Frederik Andersen mishandled a redirection got New York back even.
Andersen and Varlamov settled in from there, easing the game into the third period with a 1-1 tie. Stefan Noesen broke the deadlock. Kuznetsov's shot from the point was tipped by Brady Skjei and knocked down, allowing Noesen to backhand the loose puck home. Martin Necas finished it up with the empty-net goal in a 3-1 series-opening win. Necas, Kuznetsov, and Skjei had two points each.
Game 2 was a different story. The Islanders took a 3-0 lead early in the second period, getting goals from Kyle Palmieri and Bo Horvat late in the first before Anders Lee extended New York's advantage on the power play in the second. Teuvo Teravainen got the Canes on the board with a power-play tally, but the hill to climb was still pretty steep in the third.
The deficit was cut to one midway through the third when Seth Jarvis snapped a shot past Varlamov with help from the iron. Still, the Islanders remained in front by the time Andersen made his way to the bench for the extra attacker. With 2:15 left, Andrei Svechnikov missed the net, but Sebastian Aho was there for the backdoor finish, tying it up at three.
The Canes didn't wait long to take the lead. Before the jubilation subsided, Jordan Martinook won a battle behind the net and stuffed the puck past a confused Varlamov nine seconds later, scoring the two quickest goals in franchise history. Jake Guentzel scored into the empty net, drawing the ire of the Islanders on the ice, but it didn't prevent the Canes from completing an electric 5-3 win.
After a tight trip to New York, Game 5 brought just as much excitement
After their third three-goal comeback in the franchise's postseason history, the Hurricanes were in the same spot as a year ago, up 2-0 and heading to Long Island. Looking for a spark, the Islanders made a change in net, swapping Varlamov for Sorokin. It's not that Varlamov had played poorly. They just needed something to get back into the series.
That lasted a little over a period. Brent Burns floated a shot from the point past Sorokin, and Dmitry Orlov added another with a wrister to his blocker side. Pierre Engvall put the Islanders on the board in the second, but Aho chased Sorokin with a goal from between the dots. Brock Nelson got one back late in the second, but it wasn't enough to stop the Canes from taking a 3-0 lead.
The Islanders were one loss away from being swept by the Hurricanes for the second time since 2019. Jarvis scored eight minutes into the game on the power play, but New York scored the next two. Mathew Barzal had been quiet for three games, but he got his first of the series in the second period before Jean-Gabriel Pageau scored on the power play early in the third.
Late in regulation, the Canes' power play tied it up. Noesen redirected Teravainen's pass in front of the net, sending the series to overtime for the first time. Nothing was resolved after the first overtime, pushing the teams to a fifth period. Just 84 seconds into double overtime, Barzal tipped a shot past Andersen, giving the Islanders their first win of the series and a little life before heading to Raleigh.
The Canes and the Islanders combined for three goals in under four minutes to begin Game 5. Teravainen got it going in under 90 seconds, and Svechnikov scored on the power play less than two minutes later to double the lead. Future Hurricane Mike Reilly scored 41 seconds later, getting us off to a blistering pace in this elimination game.
The crowd got to experience a Kuznetsov penalty shot late in the period, with the forward moving at a snail's pace and outwaiting Varlamov to make it 3-1 after 20 minutes. The Islanders fought back in the second. Nelson scored early in the period, and Casey Cizikas tied it at three in the final minute, setting up an exciting third period.
There was no better time for Jack Drury to score his first postseason goal. Early in the third, a bouncing puck landed on his stick, and he immediately fired it past Varlamov. For the second time in the series, the Canes immediately got another. This time, they needed just eight seconds, breaking the franchise record a second time when Noesen got a friendly bounce to extend the lead to two.
Jarvis scored the empty-netter to close the book on the Islanders. For the second season in a row, the Canes eliminated New York in the first round. Jarvis led the team with seven points, tying Noesen with a team-high three goals. All but two skaters recorded a point for the Canes in a series that felt a lot tighter than the final game count showed.
Honestly, the goaltending for both sides was solid from Frederik Andersen and Semyon Varlamov. Andersen finished with a .912 save percentage and a 2.25 GAA. Varlamov's GAA was slightly higher, but he had a better save percentage (.914) than Andersen. Ilya Sorokin's start in Game 3 was the true outlier. It makes you wonder how that game goes if Patrick Roy doesn't opt to switch things up.
I would place Game 2 among the best postseason games of the Rod Brind'Amour era for the Hurricanes. It has all of the excitement that you ask for, plus a little history. The series might appear as if it were one-sided, but most of these games were pretty close. It's the best of their three series against the Islanders for sure.
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