Where do the Canes go from here?

It's time. Andre's out. Shane Willis from Bally Sports is in. Shane Willis, Bally Sports, pre, mid, post, everywhere for the Hurricanes. You were even on the road up in New Jersey where Carolina continued not scoring. It's been almost three games without a goal. We're not going to talk about that right now. We're going to talk about Andrei Svechnikov.

So how do you process? He got, whatever happened happened in the middle of the second period. He went to the locker room, came back, took a shift, went to the locker room, came back, took a shift, and played the whole third period.

How do you do that? We all know how strong this guy really is, but to now, you know, get some testing done yesterday and find out the results late last night of where it is, I mean, it's a little bit mind boggling that he finished the game. Yeah. Just the other night, obviously he didn't play in New Jersey. When he came into the rink, I think it was pretty obvious that he wasn't going to go against the devils, but just a huge loss.

I was kind of glad I fell asleep last night before the story broke. Everyone has questions as we always do. We know it's lower body injury. How long will it be? He's going to go for a second opinion, all those types of things. I think the big question mark isn't for the canes. I think for the fans is not, um, you know, obviously he's not going to play tonight, but I think the big question is, is there a chance he's back by the playoffs or not? And we still don't know that answer, but it's sounding like some significant time that he will be out.

Oh, there's, there's no question. I know, uh, Elliot Friedman and Pierre Lebrun tweeting out, uh, the three letters, a C and L certainly don't pour portend a fast return or return at any point during the playoffs. But again, I just keep going back to the fact that he played the third period. So ever the optimist will hold out a little bit of hope that it's not something that would keep him out for, you know, six to eight months, because if we're talking about the ladder, uh, then we're, we're talking about into at some point into next season. Um, so the hurricanes have now gone basically three games without a goal. Where does the pressure now shift other than to the obvious, uh, natures?

Wow. I think it has to be spread throughout. And I think we've talked about this team's depth all year long. And I think when you look at successful teams around the lead, except for one, the Edmonton Oilers, everyone is contributing their wins to having depth scoring and you have to have it. Uh, Connor McDavid is really exception to that rule of what he does in Edmonton on a nightly basis.

But I think the two guys you mentioned in Ajo and nature's are going to be called upon. I think table Tara Vainen is a guy that clearly RV is the guy that, you know, will be needed to start putting the puck in the back of the net. Um, and then even you go further down the list, the Jordan stall line who has shown that they've had games where they've been putting the puck in the net, you know, with Martin looking fast as a trio, they continue to get chances, but the chances will need to go in the back of an admin. If you go even a little bit further down the list, you look at a guy like Stefan Mason and what he can do on the power play, um, around that net front. I think it's across the board and then, you know, the canes have scoring power on the back end.

They've shown it, um, all season long. When you look at the stats and points from the defensive core, um, it's going to be a collective effort. I don't think you in turn and say, well, Andre is out, Marty, you got to do all the score.

I think that's, that's unrealistic. And you have to look across the room at every single guy and know that making a run is going to take every guy in that locker room and really everyone putting the puck in the back of the neck. Cause you look even at the stretch, the past stretch, Andre has been kind of the assist guy anyway. He's got four, I think four goals in his last 20 games, maybe a couple more. So the goal scoring is still there. Um, it's a big hole to fill when you lose a guy. I think it's physicality and things like that jump out to me even more in the games that he's been playing recently, but it's going to be as a collective unit.

They'll need to score more goals. Yes. Uh, yes. I pull you. Yavi is not quite the playmaker that Andre is fetched a cough is and playmaking might be what Andre is best at.

Anyway. Um, I look, I don't spend a lot of time criticizing the head coach rod Brindamore. I think it's probably unwise, uh, but I was curious about what didn't happen in New Jersey and yes, they generated a bunch of chances in the third period. I kind of brush aside the third period only because New Jersey had a three goal lead at that point. And, uh, honestly they probably, they're probably not blowing that, but I was a little surprised because rod has historically, uh, put lines in a blender when goals are not coming. And the hurricanes basically have gone three games without one, but the lines stayed the same are, do you anticipate getting a look at what they were in the morning skate? Doesn't look like we're going to get much of a change except Jack Drury is going to slide in. It looks like for Paul Stasny, um, were you a little surprised we didn't see some more, uh, shuffling around?

Wow. I, I went back even the third period was really good. I thought most of the second period is really good when you look at offensive zone time and the chances they were creating. And to me, I think that's probably from rod perspective and hearing his interview after the game where when a couple of guys made questions about scoring and things like that, rod knows all the lines were generating the chances.

So I think you look more of when he's going to shake those things up. If things were really dry and they weren't getting shots and you weren't even generating the chances, but I thought even with such the cop out, the lines did create those opportunities around the neck. I just felt through the second period when they were getting those chances, you could see that check continued to settle in more and more as you can, you know, it's one of those feelings of the players I'm standing on. Like he keeps, he's dialed in, like it's going to be one of those ricochet tips kind of goals is going to beat him tonight.

And to me, I think that's why we didn't see any shakeups. Will we tonight? Probably not because he was very adamant after the game saying we created a lot of chances. We just didn't score. And I believe in what he saw.

I agree with what he saw. So I think tonight we'll probably see the same kind of lineup. And then depending how the first period goes, which you hope is much better than the start in Jersey. I think that's the only place that kind of caught the hurricanes was there. Start wasn't awesome. And they'll need it tonight against the Jets team that, you know, needs points desperately as much as anybody in the Western Conference.

Yeah, they do. They've fallen from the top three to trying to hang on to a wildcard spot right now. Winnipeg Shane Willis is joining us here.

Carolina Hurricanes reporter Bally's pre post mid all of it. Defense has always been the calling card of this team anyway. So they've always been more about goal prevention than goal scoring, even though goal scoring really hasn't been that much of a problem. They've been top 10 and goal scored last couple of years or top 10 and goal scored now.

So it's not like they're anemic. But it's really been about preventing goals. So in that regard, nothing really changes for this team except that you're missing one of your core pieces. Yeah, I can't agree with you more when you look and we've shown us a few times on the pregame show and during the Valley broadcast where the hurricanes rank in defensive stats, and they're at the top of almost every single one of them.

If they're not the top, they're in second or the top five. So that is what this team is built around. And we talked about attention to detail all the time. So I think that somewhere they'll be really fine tuned here tonight is how defensively strong they'll need to be. And you're going to go into games. And when you don't score, you know, it's tough to win. Obviously you're not going to win if you're not scoring any goals. But I think that attention to detail defensively will be very sharp tonight.

You're always going to have games where it looks a little bit off and it is a hard system to play with secret Shane got to spare their day. And he was talking about, he said this, it's hard, you know, deep pressure, pressure, pressure, and it's hard to be a defensive in this structure, but they've shown it all year long, how it succeeds. And I expect that to kind of jump out here tonight. The other area you hope kind of maybe catches some fire would be the power play. Whenever you're looking for a goal and you can't get it, get one on the power play or something.

Rod mentioned the other night scoring off of the rush, right? Everyone plays hard defensively. When you get all five guys in the zone, there's not very rarely a breakdown where it's tic-tac-toeing in your net, but the Kings can use their speed through that neutral zone and score off the rush. So I think it, it energizes the building will be behind them and you know, a difficult blow, but I see this as a straight derailing instant for the Carolina Hurricanes or what they're planning to try and do to finish the season off. I think the biggest problem is that the timing of everything, if Andre's injury happens when the hurricanes are scored four or five goals a game, like they were a couple of weeks ago, then people are like, oh man, we're going to miss Andre. But now they, they've gone through three games with basically no goals other than the Andre goal, the power play goal at 209 of the first against Philly.

And now people are losing their minds, which frankly, that's social media for you. That's why Shane Willis is not on it. I appreciate, but I appreciate Shane coming on the program. I'll see you over at the rink later.

I appreciate your time on that. Yeah. That's why I just stay calm all the time. This team's still in a great spot. I believe in what this coaching staff is going to put forward tonight. And I believe what's in that locker room. It's amazing to watch. And Rod talks for a long time. And I think that's where, when you see him in interviews and you can see a little bit of frustration, it's not that he's frustrated with his team. He's frustrated that people are doubting what he's got inside that locker room. I think that belief will shine bright tonight against the jets. They need one. I'll talk to you later. Thanks. Shane Willis, Valley sports.