Welcome to My Mind

The 2021 season was one of the most successful regular seasons in franchise history. They posted a .714 points percentage, won a regular season division title, and qualified for the postseason for the third consecutive season, a first for the franchise since relocation. The postseason didn't go as well as they wanted, beating Nashville in six games in Round 1 before losing to Tampa Bay in five games in Round 2. This offseason rivals the summer of 2017, the summer we were finally introduced to Vegas. This team is no doubt in a better place than they were for that expansion draft four years ago. To give you some perspective of how different this team is, only three of the players the Canes protected in that draft played on the team this season (Jordan Staal, Brock McGinn, Teuvo Teravainen) and the goalie they protected was Scott Darling. There are going to be a lot of different variables to this offseason. I'm going to give a rundown of where the team is now, do my best to predic...

The Canes celebrated one of its most successful regular seasons in franchise history. It was a season full of fun and historic moments for a franchise in the midst of a resurgence. It was definitely a season unlike any other with the schedule shortened to 56 games, the divisions re-aligned to make travel easier, no out of division games, meaning you'd see your division foes eight times each, and no fans in the stands to start the season, all thanks to a pandemic we're all getting more than tired of. The Canes overcame adversity early, with the team shutting down operations for ten days early in the season after the team faced an internal COVID outbreak. It didn't slow the team down though as they raced out of the gate in a division boasting the two finalists in last season's Stanley Cup Final. There were also tough injuries to overcome, the biggest of which would be Petr Mrazek in the midst of a historic start for the franchise. After posting shutouts in two of his firs...

After winning each of their series in six games, the regular season champions, the Hurricanes, and the defending champions, the Lighting, were put on a collision course to face each other in the second round. The Lightning finished third in the division with 75 points, five points off the pace in the division. They did this without their former Hart Trophy winner and a captain that only played 38 games. With a healthy team for the entire season, they would've likely won the division again this season. The two teams split their eight matchups in the regular season, each going 4-3-1. Tampa Bay rolled into the first round with its full arsenal of players and took down Florida behind 11 points from Nikita Kucherov (3-8-11) and eight each from Alex Killorn, Steven Stamkos, and Victor Hedman. Their power play scored eight times and gave Florida so many fits they used three different goalies in the series. There's a reason they're the defending champs and not much changed for this...

Every game against the Lightning from here on out is going to be an elimination game. Unfortunately for the Canes, they're on the wrong end of this situation. Game 4 saw a ten-goal explosion between the two teams, something we hadn't seen much of in the first three games. The Lightning scored more times, winning 6-4, and taking a commanding 3-1 series in the lead. Tomorrow is no longer guaranteed for the Canes. They must win to fight another day. Tonight is the first step in the right direction. There is some game-time intrigued to this one for the Canes as both Nino Niederreiter, Vincent Trocheck, and Warren Foegele are all considered coin-flips on whether they'll play tonight. My hope is to see at least two of the three, most likely Nino and Trocheck, though any returns will be more than welcomed. The other question is which goalie will start. Rod Brind'Amour's comments this morning had people wondering who it is going to be. If I'm a betting man, which I'...

After making this into a series with a 3-2 OT win in Game 3 on the road, the Canes are looking to compound their momentum into potentially tying the series and making it a best of three series with home-ice advantage. No major lineup changes as Warren Foegele is set to go after leaving Game 3 early and Petr Mrazek will be in net following his Game 3 win. The series has been a low-scoring affair this far, so it feels like the first team to score three or more goals is likely to win this game. Neither team has shown much of an ability to do so in this series, but they have been known to do it during the regular season. This is a huge game for the team since they've played like the better team for most of the three games thus far. Andrei Vasilevskiy has been a tough nut to crack, so this is going to be an uphill battle.  1st Period: Hurricanes 0, Lightning 1 This game started exactly how I expected it to. I honestly had "matching penalties before the opening puck drop" on my...

Down 2-0 in the series and on the road for the first of two games, the Hurricanes are in desperate need of a win. They haven't been outplayed much over the first 120 minutes of the series. If you were to tell someone the Canes were outplaying the Lightning through two games, they'd likely ask if the Canes were up 2-0 or even tied 1-1 in the series, but they'd be extremely surprised to see them on the losing end of both games. After losing Nino Niederreiter to start the series, now Vincent Trocheck is down for the time being and Morgan Geekie is in for the first time in the series. No disrespect to Geekie, but being down Nino and Trocheck is a major shot to an offense that is already struggling to score goals against the world's best goalie, Andrei Vasilevskiy. Speaking of goaltending, Rod Brind'Amour is looking to shoot some adrenaline into the arms of the team by starting Petr Mrazek tonight. This is not an indictment of how Alex Nedeljkovic is playing because I...