GDT: Canes @ Preds: Time to 1-2 Step on their HeeHaws

[Stickpucker]

Tripp suggesting team is mentally tired. Mike says yup can’t play this style for 82 games. Well no kidding. We have only one scoring line and even they are not consistent lately.

Bring up some Wolves and inject some fresh guys into the lineup. Stastny and Stephan are just awful.

Jarvis, Teravainen, and Andersen took the season off and are ready to step up BIG now.

 

[Stickpucker]

Okay, but we've also seen this team play...just SO much better than they have been lately. This season even! So it gets frustrating to see them struggle against teams they shouldn't have trouble against, at a time in the season when they should be upping their game for the playoffs.

I miss some of the pretty tic tac toe goals we were seeing earlier in the season.

 

[Borsig]

We know how this ends.

I mean let's be honest. We're probably the easiest team in the playoffs to shut down or shut out.

 

[skipnjump]

It was not a good game. I gave up after 2. I hate to say it, but I think me wearing a Preds shirt last night was some bad luck. Not that I'm superstitious or anything ...

Like the rest of you on the board. I am a bit concerned with the effort in the last few games. I think that the players are just worn out mentally and physically. It's almost like we are playing just for the season and not making sure we have some energy left for the post-season.

 

[A Star is Burns]

As I've said, if the team eases up down the stretch, they ran out of gas and tried too hard earlier in the season. If the team wins all the games down the stretch with high effort, they peaked at the wrong time and used up all their energy before the playoffs. In reality, none of it probably matters. I'm sure the team will look plenty energized in the playoffs and what they look like down the stretch will have next to nothing to do with how they perform in the playoffs. It's all going to be about getting some of the guys playing to the level they are capable of at the same time for two months and some luck. The rest is just narratives and noise.

 

[hockey diva]

It was not a good game. I gave up after 2. I hate to say it, but I think me wearing a Preds shirt last night was some bad luck. Not that I'm superstitious or anything ...

Like the rest of you on the board. I am a bit concerned with the effort in the last few games. I think that the players are just worn out mentally and physically. It's almost like we are playing just for the season and not making sure we have some energy left for the post-season.

But your sister appreciates your sacrifice!

 

[WreckingCrew]

As I've said, if the team eases up down the stretch, they ran out of gas and tried too hard earlier in the season. If the team wins all the games down the stretch with high effort, they peaked at the wrong time and used up all their energy before the playoffs. In reality, none of it probably matters. I'm sure the team will look plenty energized in the playoffs and what they look like down the stretch will have next to nothing to do with how they perform in the playoffs. It's all going to be about getting some of the guys playing to the level they are capable of at the same time for two months and some luck. The rest is just narratives and noise.

The past 3 playoff runs would suggest this not to be the case...all 3 seasons we peaked early, struggled towards the last 1/3-1/4 of the season, then never really found a groove in playoffs. Last year we literally couldn't win a single game away from the home-advantage, and we eventually lost one at home. We've been shutout 4 times in our last 15 games, and scored at 2.26 GF/GP...for comparison the Blackhawks are dead-last over the season at 2.41 GF/GP (and it feels like our defense has scored 50% of those). If they suddenly figure it out in the playoffs and make a deep run and play close games and give their all, it will all be forgiven even if they eventually get beat by a better team.

 

[Sigurd]

Team plays better in front of Raanta

It's starting to feel that way to me.

It has to be Auntie and Koochie in the playoffs, right?

Yes. Hopefully Rantaa can stay healthy. I feel good about him in the net these days other than that.

Look at the good side. We only have a few more games before moving on from Andersen.

What a monkey he is.

Swayman or Hart would be good trade replacements if we can still trade for a good top 6 forward too. For one thing, both are still only 24 years old (both are also 6'2). Normally I'd say Swayman would cost way too much, but Boston is gonna be in a cap crunch this summer. Boston would probably trade him to someone else since Carolina is a big competitor of theirs in the east though.

2 power plays

0 shots on goal

1 goal against


Jeff Daniels is a fantastic coach

That's Hurricanes hockey baby!

I don't care if there's only a 2% difference between the 9th ranked PP and ours at 20th (as Shane Willis pointed out earlier this week) when we struggle to even have 1 shot on goal on the power play. I could accept our powerplay being ranked 20th if we actually looked like a threat a decent amount of the time on the PP even if we don't score quite as often as other teams.

Aho to the Box. HAHAHAH

I honestly didn't even see him do anything to the Nashville player. Hopefully it was just out of the camera frame for the replay. Idk. The refs didn't penalize a Nashville guy for a high sticking though; our guy was holding his face afterwards.

Shots 38-14 and we’re down by 2….can’t make this shit up!

So, another typical Carolina loss. A lot could be said about this being so common for their losses (not just this season either).

You know, it really doesn't matter of Freddie lets in a few softies per game, if this team (outside of the defense) can't figure out how to score 2+ f***ing goals against a f***ing AHL goalie or 1-2 f***ing goals against an NHL goalie we're never going anywhere.

It's amazing how many underdog goalies Carolina makes look good.

Tripp suggesting team is mentally tired. Mike says yup can’t play this style for 82 games. Well no kidding. We have only one scoring line and even they are not consistent lately.

Bring up some Wolves and inject some fresh guys into the lineup. Stastny and Stephan are just awful.

Nah, we aren't bringing up fresh guys into the line up; makes a little too much sense. Nashville has so many young guys on their team right now (as we were told so many times during the broadcast), but we don't wanna try something different by putting a young guy in place of Stastny or Stephan. Before someone says anything, yes, I know the two teams are in different situations.

 

[A Star is Burns]

The past 3 playoff runs would suggest this not to be the case...all 3 seasons we peaked early, struggled towards the last 1/3-1/4 of the season, then never really found a groove in playoffs. Last year we literally couldn't win a single game away from the home-advantage, and we eventually lost one at home. We've been shutout 4 times in our last 15 games, and scored at 2.26 GF/GP...for comparison the Blackhawks are dead-last over the season at 2.41 GF/GP (and it feels like our defense has scored 50% of those). If they suddenly figure it out in the playoffs and make a deep run and play close games and give their all, it will all be forgiven even if they eventually get beat by a better team.

You're free to interpret things that way, sure. But there are plenty of other valid explanations. BBA even provided evidence that it wasn't the case for some of the previous seasons. And the year we peaked early as much as any, we went to round 3. I think the reality is, playoffs are a small sample size where you play one team at a time multiple times and people try to assign overarching reasons across multiple years that probably don't really matter.

 

[MinJaBen]

You're free to interpret things that way, sure. But there are plenty of other valid explanations. BBA even provided evidence that it wasn't the case for some of the previous seasons. And the year we peaked early as much as any, we went to round 3. I think the reality is, playoffs are a small sample size where you play one team at a time multiple times and people try to assign overarching reasons across multiple years that probably don't really matter.

We either suck or we are awesome, and it is completely determined by the last 5 or so games we play.


It is that simple.

 

[Borsig]

We either suck or we are awesome, and it is completely determined by the last 5 or so games we play.


It is that simple.

We have the 2nd worst PP in the league since like march 1 and are like 4th worst in GF. I Literally have zero excitment for the playoffs this year, and would much rather us had the pick.

 

[Boom Boom Apathy]

We have the 2nd worst PP in the league since like march 1 and are like 4th worst in GF.

Where do those PP stats come from? According to team stats on NHL.com.

From March 1st until today, the Canes have played 20 games and their PP is 9th best in the NHL at 24%.

NHL Stats

The official source for NHL Stats including skaters, goalies, teams stats and more.

www.nhl.com

The problem is they are 20th in PP opportunities during that stretch. They also have the best PK% since March 1st.

They are indeed 4th worst in Goals for / GP though. 5v5 goals scoring is terrible.

 

[Borsig]

Where do those PP stats come from? According to team stats on NHL.com.

From March 1st until today, the Canes have played 20 games and their PP is 9th best in the NHL at 24%.

NHL Stats

The official source for NHL Stats including skaters, goalies, teams stats and more.

www.nhl.com

The problem is they are 20th in PP opportunities during that stretch. They also have the best PK% since March 1st.

They are indeed 4th worst in Goals for / GP though. 5v5 goals scoring is terrible.

The PP stat was the 11th not 1st. ESPN nationals said it

 

[Boom Boom Apathy]

The PP stat was the 11th not 1st. ESPN nationals said it

Ah..got it.

 

[Anton Dubinchuk]

If you can go from 9th best to 2nd worst in a matter of 10 days (meaning, adding or subtracting 5 games), maybe it’s not a very useful way to look at the stat lol

 

[Blueline Bomber]

You could just do the eye test instead and say "How many times has our powerplay had the opportunity to get scoring started, give us the lead, tie the game or put the game away? And how many times has it failed to do any of that?"

I can remember a few games where the PP tied the game or scored late to win the game. I can remember FAR more games where the PP was a significant hindrance to the game, even in games the Canes would eventually win.

 

[Navin R Slavin]

You could just do the eye test instead and say "How many times has our powerplay had the opportunity to get scoring started, give us the lead, tie the game or put the game away? And how many times has it failed to do any of that?"

I can remember a few games where the PP tied the game or scored late to win the game. I can remember FAR more games where the PP was a significant hindrance to the game, even in games the Canes would eventually win.

Wouldn't almost every fan base say the same thing, even the ones with elite power plays?

 

[Nikishin Go Boom]

The PP isn’t going to score every game. The PP percentages don’t line up that way. With our lack of drawing them, it won’t score for a couple of games and still maintain a good percentage.

Generally our PP performs very well for a team that lacks elite scoring.

 

[Anton Dubinchuk]

Wouldn't almost every fan base say the same thing, even the ones with elite power plays?

Yeah unless your PP is over 50% and you don’t have selective memory, you will always remember more times that the PP failed than succeeded.

 

[A Star is Burns]

Yeah, I'm going to guess that when elite power plays still fail to score like 70% of the time, they all probably tend to skew towards more negative than positive outcomes for any given scenario.

 

[Blueline Bomber]

Wouldn't almost every fan base say the same thing, even the ones with elite power plays?

The ones with elite power plays wouldn’t (presumably) be worried about how their PP is performing. I imagine Edmonton fans are drooling at the mouth every time their team draws a penalty. Thus, if they go on a bit of a drought, they’re not as concerned. I imagine they have enough games where, even if it doesn‘t convert, the PP looks dangerous and generates actual scoring chances.

Compare that to our situation, where it seems that it’s more productive for the Canes to simply take a penalty immediately after drawing one, just to play 4-on-4, because playing on the powerplay not only doesn’t convert, but kills off any flow or momentum the team may have.

I don’t need to explain the issue with the PP, because we’ve all seen it. Tell me if this sounds familiar:

Passing the puck around the perimeter, no one in front of the net, no movement from the players to force the opposing team out of the PK box. We set up a point shot, hoping for a rebound. If it’s not blocked, it goes to the side of the net. Whoever recovers it tries to blindly pass it out front, behind the back, nothing but a hope and a prayer. Opposing player gets the puck, because there’s 4 of them there, and shoots it down the ice. We spend the next 30 seconds trying to enter the zone. If we manage to do so, repeat the first part again.

It gets old to watch, it’s easily figured out by now, and it will cost us in the playoffs, because if we can’t score on the PP, there’s zero reason not to take liberties against us. Doesn’t matter if they get caught holding, hooking, boarding, etc, because we won’t score on the resulting PP and may even lose momentum by doing so.

 

[chaz4hockey]

LY until the last 6, the Canes staggered down the stretch going 8-4-4 in march and then were 3-5 in first eight in April (though April 16) before winning the last 6. (2 against Devils and 1 vs AZ).

So, a 45 day hiccup before playing better against somewhat softer competition the last 10 days. Thus, I suggest that the end of year slow down concept still applies:

 

[The Faulker 27]

 

[Surrounded By Ahos]

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We may not even make the playoffs at this rate.

 

[Tryamw]

We may not even make the playoffs at this rate.

Math doesn't check out but we should run with this!! Tell all the islander and Pens fans