The Carolina Hurricanes ~ Will They Storm Their Way To Victory? By Jennifer Kate

Well, these hockey blogs are getting all too familiar, aren’t they? But anyways, Jennifer Kate of Slap Shots Fired back with another blog. This time I’m talking about another team who is in the race for the Stanley Cup, the Carolina Hurricanes. This team is filled with former Ranger players, which is always a fun thing to talk about.

The Carolina Hurricanes came in first place in the Metropolitan Division ending the season 52-21-9 for a total of 113 points. Now let’s look a little deeper into the 2022-2023 Carolina Hurricanes Roster, shall we?

Starting with a name a lot of people might recognize, because he’s been around the league since 2003, and that guy is none other than Brent Burns. Fun fact: When he joined the NHL, I was 5 years old, which is crazy considering he is still playing games to this day. Burns, drafted in 2003 by the Minnesota Wild, ended the regular season with 18 goals and 43 assists and was a +11.

Let’s move on to some of my favorite people on the Carolina Hurricanes -- some former New York Rangers. First off let’s talk about Jesper Fast. I’m sorry, I'm about to get slightly biased here, but I wish Fast was still a Ranger; he was very good. Fast ended this past regular season with 10 goals and 19 assists and was a +9 overall.

Now I know a lot of people are going to come at me and say his numbers aren’t great, and you're correct. But he is a hard-working team player and that work ethic is what makes him a great player.

Brady Skjei is another good former Ranger, and he ended the regular season with 18 goals and 20 assists and was a +7 overall.

Let’s move on to some non-former Ranger players. This next player may or may not ring some bells for people, but this guy's name is one we’ve been hearing a lot throughout playoffs and that is Sebastian Aho. For those of you wondering, not I'm not talking about the imposter on the Islanders. Aho ended the regular season with 36 goals and 31 assists and was a +8 overall.

Now let’s talk about the Hurricanes' Cup run thus far. In the first round, they beat The New York Islanders. Now if I’m being honest, I thought that was gonna be an easy sweep for Carolina, and boy was I mistaken. The Islanders took the Hurricanes to game 6. A lot of people were talking about Carolina having a rough go because they had a lot of players out with injuries, even though Carolina had made it to the playoffs multiple years in a row and has always been right around the top of the division every year.

Now in round two, they played the New Jersey Devils. This series appeared to be a long one, but that turned out not to be the case. The Devils did the same thing as the New York Rangers and laid down and died, as the Hurricanes won in five games.

The Hurricanes are currently playing the Florida Panthers in the Eastern Conference and this series has been crazy so far. Game 1 went to four overtimes, which is nuts, but unfortunately for Carolina, they did end up losing that game, thanks to a goal by Matthew Tkachuk. Game 2 of this series also went to overtime, where once again Carolina lost to Florida.

Right now, Florida currently leads this series 2-0, but this series is going to 7. I think the Canes have an epic comeback in them.

Anyways, I think this is a good place to end this blog. I want to quickly say for anyone who maybe doesn’t know hockey that well, or is just starting to learn about hockey, that the NHL is completely unpredictable. You could be the best team in the league all year and choke away a 3-1 series lead (yes, I’m looking at you Boston).

The Stanley Cup Playoffs have been insane up and down with huge upsets, and I think either one of these series can go either way at any point.

I’ll catch you guys for the next blog!