Canes are back at it tomorrow!

All right, we are just...let's see if I can do the math here. Let's assume it's an 815 puck drop. We are 30 hours away from game number one. That was poor math. 32 hours away.

Gosh, I hope Eddie Olchik of TNT does better math than I. Mr. Olchik, welcome back. I just saw you the other day. How you doing?

I'm doing well, Adam. Thanks for having me. Yeah, it's been a long time since being on your show, but getting ready to head into Raleigh and looking forward to a...I think it's going to be a very entertaining series and I think people are going to get a chance to see a couple of teams that know what they're on the verge of possibly and I think anything goes. So obviously a big rival over the years and just looking forward to being a part of our TNT broadcast tomorrow night. Yeah, tomorrow night and if all things go well for Carolina, we will see you a lot over the next month because you're going to be busy even after this series is over.

At this point, and Eddie Olchik is joining us from TNT, whatever happened during the regular season, who finished where? I mean, I know it's a cliche, but none of that matters to the players at all, right? No, I mean, I think some things, maybe some trends, Adam, or some areas of having success, whether it's on especially teams or you have a guy's number, whether it's a shooter against a goalie or vice versa, but really at this time of year, uh, you know, been, you know, having played as long as I did in the league for 16 years and in coaching and now being a broadcaster for a very, very long time is completely off time.

The rate gets a little smaller. And what I mean by that is it seems like every shift could be the difference in whether your season continues or not. Uh, it feels like the other team has six players on the ice, not, you know, usually only five, but it seems like that every shift or somebody contesting a, an exit or a pass or a shot and everything is for keeps. So some players have the ability to be able to adjust. Some teams have the ability to be able to adjust.

And you could rely on some of the things that happen to the heart of your question, Adam, in the regular season, but it is a way different animal come playoff time. And you just never know when the tide is going to turn because I'm sure as you've seen in, in, in your years of following the canes is that momentum and playoff hockey is, is just incredibly, uh, impactful. And when you have it, you got to do something with it. You know, when you got all the momentum, maybe a drop penalty, maybe a score, a goal, maybe you, you know, you, you, you kill the clock. Um, and when you, when it's against you, you have to find a way to stop it and then get it back on your side.

So what is that? You know, maybe it's a couple of guys dropping the gloves. Maybe it's a big penalty kill.

Maybe it's a big save. So when you have the Mo, what do you do with it and what it's against you, how do you stop it and then get it back on your side. And, and that's when you got to really make the hay is when you have the momentum. So that's what makes, you know, like, and I'm not a little biased. I'm a lot biased when it comes to playoff hockey and the national hockey league, like when you like it, there's nothing better. And when you feel it and especially when you're at home and you know, I know the caniacs are going to be up for grabs tomorrow night and they're going to be all lathered up and ready to go in the series. It's, it's, it's something that is the home team you can feed off of.

And it's, it's a real important part of playoff hockey, the emotion that you play with. Hurricanes have been obviously very good at home. The only loss is against the Islanders in game five, a closeout game where they probably played their best game of that series.

It just didn't go their way. Florida though, has been ridiculous on the way they five and one on the road, six and one on the road. They won all three games in Toronto. They know six and one, they went all three games in Toronto and three out of four in Boston. The, the amount of confidence they bring in here has got to be unprecedented.

Yeah. And look, I, I, I know that rod Brenda Moore and his staff and you know, the players don't you know, don't underestimate those numbers on the road. I mean, they've been very, very comfortable now, you know, look at down three to one in the series and round one against Boston, who maybe for some novice hockey fans or people that don't follow the national hockey league, the Boston Bruins had the, you know, arguably the greatest regular season of any team in the history of the national hockey league. And they had a series where they were up three games to one and the goaltender now of choice or the flavor of, you know, of late round one in the flavor of round two for former caniac head coach, Paul Maurice. Now in Florida is now Sergei Babosky, where he wasn't at the end of the year. And he wasn't in the first four games of the, of the playoffs.

And he has really saved their backside with the way that he has performed and played and upset Boston. And, you know, look at, I, I didn't think it was that big of an upset for them taking out Toronto because Toronto had just had come off winning their first playoff series in round one and a long time. And Florida was, you know, obviously a really good team last year that fell a little short and this year they barely got into the playoffs and made some big changes.

So look, I just, there's a lot going on there. And, and, and Carolina certainly knows that like, look at, there's nothing easy about playing in a playoffs. Like you can't look at Florida and go out a while, you know, they were in eight seed. They were lucky to get in and, you know, like that, that's not that if Florida happens to win this series, it's not going to be because there was a lack of respect or they took them lightly. That's not going to happen. That, that does not happen. That's not going to happen with this team.

It's just, it's not going to happen. It's just going to be where, you know, maybe they just, you know, got a bounce or they got a better goaltending and those types of things. So they'll be prepared. It's just whether or not they can go out there and execute and get the job done, but Florida, they've got a little something going on right now.

They got a swagger about them. They're getting the goaltending and they, they give themselves and feel they have every opportunity and look right now. Do I think they have the better goaltending going into this, into the series?

Would I give them the old check mark or the tail of the tape, Adam? Yeah, I probably would with the way that Bob is playing, but, but he has the ability to go sideways at any time here. And then when that happens, then obviously all bets are off. And the old chick from TNT is joining us here. He'll have, he'll be the lead analyst for the Eastern conference files, which starts tomorrow, just after eight o'clock at PNC arena. I mean, there's a reason why Alex Lyon started the last seven games of the regular season and the playoffs, but Brodsky wasn't injured. He's he was just not playing well. Lyon got on a roll and they tried to roll with it. And I don't blame Paul Maurice for doing that, but there's also a reason why Bob Brovsky is about a $10 million a year goaltender, because at some point he was this type of goalie.

But you, I think you gave us the answer in your last answer. Florida was the best team in the NHL by record a year ago. While there were changes, the core of this team is basically the same, but with maybe a little bit of a harder edge with Matthew Kuchuk in for basically replacing Jonathan Huberdough. So this is a Florida team and Rod said it the other day, they're supposed to be this.

This is what they were supposed to be. And this is who they've become, even though it took a while. Yeah, because of their, of the character of a guy like Matthew Kuchuk who came over in that big summer deal from Calgary. And, you know, it's a different look.

He gives you a little bit of everything. Like he's, you know, the Caniac, the fan base is certainly, if they don't know Matthew Kuchuk, they're, they're going to know him by the time, probably you get seven minutes into the first period because he's probably going to be, you know, on the, he's going to be either on the line or over the line every once in a while. And, and that's just, you know, just the way that he plays.

So yeah, you're right. They disappointed in a major way last year. They got knocked out and swept by the Tampa Bay lightning in round two and they made changes and they got a little bit of a harder edge and, you know, I think a little harder to play against. And I think they've got a guy that says, you know what, I'm going into the fight and whether you guys are with me or not, I'm going in there.

So, you know, you better grab on because I'm going to lead the way. And that's how they play. And I think, I think Roddy is exactly right. It's like, look at this is what everybody expected last year.

Didn't happen. Well, here they are this year as an eight feed and, and nobody's, you know, nobody's faking them lightly with the, what they've done to take out Boston and then obviously take out Toronto. You're going to say the, the phrase, the words, former hurricane a lot over the course of this series.

Not only is it Eric Stahl, but it's also E2 Lou Sterenin, who's a very good third line player for the Panthers and obviously Paul Maurice. What in your mind, Eddie Olchik, ultimately tips the scale in this series one way or the other? Well, I, I look in at the one matchup, assuming again, you know, we, we know all about assuming and, and at the end of that, of that phrase, but like can the new Chevy Silverado HD puts you in 14.4 inch diagonal touch screen, the new Chevy Silverado HD own work, own play, own life. Learn more at chevy.com.

Find new roads, Chevrolet. Ken Burns and Slavin and Jacob Slavin is one of my favorite players. And still, I think he's still one of the more underrated players in the entire national hockey league. Like this guy's a, I mean, he's just a beast.

He's just, he's all world. And, and he's so, so good defensively is can those guys get burns and slave and that match up on the backend limit to Chuck and Bennett, that combo and whoever plays up their cousins or whoever they might put there at any particular time, because those guys are really the, those guys are the facilitators Adam, those guys are the, uh, the engine of that team. And if you want to, you know, force Florida to, you know, uh, have somebody else beat you and they have other guys that can beat you bark off and Reinhardt. I mean, they, they got a deep team is can that defensive pair do what they did in the first two rounds. I look at in fairness, they have not faced a team yet in the playoffs like Florida. Like I think Florida is a combination Adam of the Islanders and the devils where you're going to get run into the end boards and somebody is going to look to try to run you into the third or fourth row. And that happened, I would say probably more often than not in the Islander series. Cause I thought at times, I thought the Islanders had the canes on the run early in that, you know what I mean? Like they just, they, they couldn't score. They couldn't finish. They could not defend when they needed to defend. And I think it was, it was Jacob Slavin that scored that incredible goal.

I forget what game it was where he scored from below the goal line. Yeah. Right. So, you know, so like, I think with a team against Florida, I don't know if you can, you can play that way and be on the winning end of that.

Right. But I look at it and go, well, Florida also has some of the skill that New Jersey had. So this will be the first time I think that the canes are really going to get tested in a lot of different ways. If you want to play a grind amount game with Florida and a physical game, they can play that way. If you want to trade chances at them and, and, and, and, and, and play an offensive type of game, Florida has that ability and they got some guys on the backend. So Carolina hasn't seen, you know, I don't want to say they're looking at themselves in the mirror because I don't think that that's, that's fair right now because they're not healthy that being Carolina, but they're going to look at a team that, well, you want to, you want to play physical, they can play that way.

You want to play a wide open game. They can play that way. So how does Carolina adjust to playing against a team that can play any way that they want? And that defensive pair has to limit could shock in Bennett.

They're going to get their chances, but you just can't give them any freebies. And I think that ends up the side, look at, take the goaltending out of it because we know, like, if you don't get it, you're not going to win. We understand that. So take the goalies out of it. And I said earlier, I give, you know, I give the check Mark to, to Babrowski right now, regardless of rod decides to play here in the series, or maybe you see both goings. I don't know, but I would look at that as, as being absolutely pivotal for Carolina to, to limit the opportunities that you get from the facilitators of the Panthers. I'll see you on the, the fifth floor of PNC arena coming up tomorrow.

Eddie old chick. I appreciate your time. And then maybe we'll talk Preakness tomorrow.

I look forward to it. Yeah. Big day of racing in Baltimore. And hopefully we can be on the right side of the, of the Preakness only hate eight horse fields. So I'll just tip everybody off. If you liked it, if you liked the number seven, that that might be where I'm leaning on Saturday. So that, that's all I'm going to, all right.

Number seven on Saturday. Thank you, Eddie. I'll talk to you later. All right. Eddie from TNT. Appreciate his time.