Canes are in NY taking on the Rangers tonight!

So the penalty kill pretty much won the game in Philadelphia and against the Rangers. It seems like that has been the difference just about every time.

What did you like about what you guys did in Philly? On the kill? Yeah. Is that what you're asking me?

Yes. Well obviously we got the job done and that's the most important thing. How you do it is probably secondary to actually doing it. I thought we limited their chances for the most part and that's the key. And then obviously when you take five penalties they're going to get some opportunities.

Ten minutes in the box out of 60 is not a good recipe for success. And tonight for sure. If that ends up like that, the power play here is probably the top. If not the top couple power plays in the league, you're not going to get away with that.

So we definitely have to try to limit that. Yeah and the Rangers power plays seven for their last 18. They have won five in a row all on the road. And it has always been the barometer of success in this series. Not that you have to win it but you can't lose it.

And that's really what you're trying to win it but if you lose it, it's a problem. Freddy Anderson came up big. In the third period he was amazing. But really in the two power plays or three power plays in the second period, I thought Freddy was probably at his best and it really erased what was not a great first period for him.

True. We played a great first period as a team. 15 minutes into it. I think they had three shots. One was a dangerous one but really that was it. And then we had that little mistake in the neutral zone. And it was a grade A chance but I know he'd like to have that back.

And obviously the next one for sure. So it's tough to have a period like that and then we're down. But then to his credit that's where he got, like you said, he took over the game for us. In the third especially. We had five or six where they had grade As right in front and it wasn't pretty but he got the job done and we were able to sweep that one out. So like this game in that regard, hopefully, I don't know about this team if we can give up even marginal goals. We got to make sure we don't let those ones in but he definitely held the fort down after that. Especially since we're talking about you guys on the defensive end. The Rangers right now are averaging allowing just two goals a game. They allowed seven on this five game road trip in which they won all five games.

I want to ask you about your fourth line. Jack Drury was centering Andrei Svetchnikov and Steph Nason for most of that game, even though Andrei took some shifts elsewhere. What did you like about them? I thought is certainly in the first period they might have been your best line. They created the first goal.

What did what have you liked about them? And what is the opportunity for Jack here? Well, it's like this and it's not the spot. I mean, especially going to be moved out of there tonight just to get him up with some, you know, where he needs to be. But when you have a guy like that down in that spot, he's playing against their fourth line and they're more than likely their third set of defense. So it's just a great advantage for them in the sense that obviously you're not playing against top pairing.

And so it is a good matchup for us. But obviously we got to get our top guys in the top rotations there, get a little more ice time. So that's what I like for his opportunity with Jack. Just in general, even tonight, you'll have two scoring wingers. So we now we're expecting, you know, not expecting expecting, but we'd like to see a little offense out of that group because you have, you know, the good wingers that that's what they do. And so it's a big opportunity for him for sure.

Yeah. I mean, it's a responsibility for for Jack and you know, he wants to cement his role with this team. Do you get the sense sometimes and he might be a little snake bit because it seems like all of his goals are called back. But do you get the sense that he might be putting, you know, a lot of pressure on himself to produce? You know, I don't see it.

I don't see it in the game, which is great. You know, we're not asking him to score a bunch of goals, but he's listen. He's done a good job and you know, but again, no, I think there is some offense to the game for sure. I mean, we haven't he's basically on a power play.

If one of these guys go down, right? He certainly thinks the game in that regard. All right before I let you go Rob, Brenda Moore defensively, you're still without Brett Pesci and you'll be without him for another couple of weeks. But what have you liked about the second and third pairs Tony and Brady obviously have some chemistry going back to their days with the Rangers.

And what has Jalen Chatfield meant maybe to Dimitri Orloff? Well, I think, you know, listen, it's kind of we're probably switching them up again today just because you know, it was better, but it's still not where it needs to be gave up. So if you like, you know, you look at that third period, it was just not how we draw it up and it was, you know, I think chat is a stable in force where we put him because he's got such good closing speed, right? So if somebody gets, you know, beat or whatever, he's got his ability to shut it down, you know, we're still kind of I think searching a little bit on the deep pairings to get the exact fit. Because we I think general these 10 games that we played, I would say we, you know, we've given up more than I'd like to see and it's there's a few guys that definitely have to, you know, I would say have the blunt of it, if you know what I mean? So I got a we definitely have to get them down. Is this sort of a kind of a litmus litmus test game for you to judge where your team is now, you know, 10 games into the season?

Well, it's a great it's one of the better teams in the league. So for sure, you know, it's going to be big challenge, you know, for me that every time we play these guys, especially in this building, it's always seems to come down to they get those extra power plays and it's just turned it. That's where the game gets turned and if we can just keep the game, you know, to a five on five game or just limit the amount of power plays yet because that's just they just really build off that because it's there's their elite added and they even whether they don't score it's they build on it. So that to me is going to be the crucial part of the game. Good luck tonight. We'll talk to you from Long Island on Saturday. Okay, you got it.