Hurricanes, with Game 5 at home, have a chance to move on with some momentum
Everyone woke up Monday in a world where the Carolina Hurricanes can win a road playoff game and score multiple power-play goals, where a guy who’s never played a single game for them can become an instant star, where their best player asserted himself as the best player when they needed it most, where Antti Raanta tore his pants making yet another big save instead of some part of his anatomy.
Some alternate universe, this must be.
Things are suddenly looking up for the Hurricanes, coming home for Game 5 on Tuesday with a chance to close things out against the New York Islanders and not only move on to the second round but bring a healthy dose of momentum and confidence with them.
Having shown they can meet the Islanders’ challenge in terms of physicality while pressing their skill advantage, there’s no reason to let this series linger any longer than necessary. Good teams know how important it is to take care of business in this spot — and not, just for example, turn the puck over on an overtime power play and have to go all the way back across the continent to Edmonton — and if the Hurricanes are the team they claim to be, they will.
Wrapping up this series in five games would have the additional benefit of avoiding some wear and tear on a roster that’s already pretty worn and torn, even as Jack Drury appears to have escaped serious injury after being sent face-first into the boards early in Sunday’s 5-2 win. Newcomer Mackenzie MacEachern’s star turn Sunday was as welcome as it was unexpected, but when it comes to reinforcements, he was about it.
Derek Stepan, a healthy scratch Sunday, is still available in reserve, but beyond that none of the other forwards called up from the Chicago Wolves — Alexei Ponomarev, Ville Koivunen, Jamieson Rees, Ryan Suzuki — have any NHL experience. Throwing any of them into this series would amount to depraved indifference. Rees, a tough little nut (to borrow from Roy Williams), might be able to survive, but being able to contribute is another matter. So at this point, with a chance to put a period on the series in five games, preservation would be as important a benefit from brevity as advancement.
The best-case scenario from the beginning was to shut this series down quickly, get some rest and watch as the New Jersey Devils and New York Rangers beat each other into a fine pulp. That scenario didn’t envision losing Teuvo Teravainen, or engaging in another spring of guess-the-absence with Frederik Andersen.
“I think he’s good to go tomorrow,” Hurricanes coach Rod Brind’Amour said Monday, but at this point, an astrologer would have as good an idea when Andersen will actually appear in a playoff game for the Hurricanes, if he ever does.
But the rest of it is still out there for the taking, if the Hurricanes are willing to take it.
The goal all along was not to win one playoff game, or one playoff series, but to get far beyond where they got last year, that disappointing second-round loss to the Rangers. Coaches and players never look at the big picture, but it’s possible for outsiders to take a step back and see beyond the next-game mentality, and from that lofty, detached height it’s easy to discern the difference in long-term implications between putting an end to this series now and letting it drag on, or worse, squandering the accomplishments of Game 4 and letting the Islanders get back into a position where they can win it.
Without Teravainen and Andrei Svechnikov and Max Pacioretty, the Hurricanes may not quite be the team they hoped they would be, but they have the opportunity to give the group that remains the very best chance at achieving some or all of those goals anyway. Taking care of business Tuesday night is the shortest path to that point.
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This story was originally published April 24, 2023 at 1:33 PM with the headline "Hurricanes, with Game 5 at home, have a chance to move on with some momentum."
