ACC football playoffs, Canes, and the Panthers

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See website for details. Canes are nine and seven and kind of wandering through the first quarter of the season. We're almost at the quarter mark. So by the time this homestand is over, we are going to be 25% of the way through the hurricanes season. We're going to get to the Canes. But before we do that, because I know Luke fancies himself a good tiebreaker scenario.

Luke Ticock from the News and Observer joins us as always on a Friday on the Adam Gold Show. Have you gone through the potential tiebreakers for North Carolina and Louisville? Because I believe Louisville, if they lose to Miami this weekend, they would win a tiebreaker with NC State if they finish with two losses or with Virginia Tech by virtue of head to head. Yeah. The scenario where it starts to get interesting for UNC is if Virginia Louisville loses, NC State loses and you get into a common opponents tiebreaker between Louisville and Virginia Tech and NC State. And then it I mean, I have Patrick Stevens and I have gone down the rabbit hole on this extremely complicated. Yeah. My decision that we made Saturday night after UNC beat Duke is to revisit it on Sunday.

Because it's just too it really is. There's too many variables right now. You can break them all down in the flowchart and it ends up being you know, it ends up depending on Pitt. It depends on Virginia. I think it depends on Georgia Tech. It depends on Georgia Tech. It depends until last night. Dependent on Boston College.

There is a lot of things going, a lot of moving parts. So it's you know, the reality is Virginia Tech has a very small chance to get in the ACC championship game. UNC has an even smaller chance to get in the ACC championship game. Virginia has every chance to get into the ACC championship game and will certainly make for some interesting number crunching. If they can't beat Miami, Louisville, not not Virginia and Louisville. So I'm like Virginia.

Holy cow. No, no, no. But Virginia matters. There's a Virginia, you know, Virginia who they play, you know, playing Virginia Tech in the last week. If that result matters, then Virginia matters. So, yeah, I mean, Virginia's in here too.

Yes. If Louisville beats Miami, they make it all moot and saves everybody a lot of time. And I actually think it's probably moot anyway because Carolina's the loss to Georgia Tech is likely going to be, I think, reading through the tiebreaker, is likely going to be the thing that ultimately kicks them out because Louisville beat Georgia Tech. I guess it does matter if, well, maybe the Miami.

I don't know. Miami's two and four. Miami's not. They could finish for four.

Anyway, let's let's drop that. The Carolina Hurricanes look to caucus here. The Carolina Hurricanes are nine and seven. But they have set the bar where nine and seven is unacceptable and it's unacceptable to them. And it's unacceptable to them, not just in record, but how they've gone about achieving nine and seven, because they haven't always played well, even in the wins. Flip side of that is some of their losses. I think Rod Brind'Amour has been OK with with the way they have played, but they have not put games together like they have in the past years where it always looks the same. And then sometimes you just don't win.

But they win most of them. What do you think the biggest factor is for that, even though goaltending has been spotty? I don't think goaltending is really the problem with them playing their game. No, no, goaltending is an issue with the results. But this is a process, not results situation.

You know, Rod Brind'Amour got that from Peter, and Jordan Saul got that from Rod Brind'Amour. The process is the problem, not the results. They could be seven and nine and playing great and not care.

Right. But the inability to play their game, to play their direct, straightforward pressure game, has become confounding. Now, some of that is new guys coming in. You know, some of that is, you know, the struggles of the Orlov-D'Angelo pairing. Some of that is Marty Neches going back to being bad Marty Neches at times when it's five on five, certainly three on three. He's still an ace. But you could see it in the game against the Flyers the other night.

A lot of butt checks from Marty Neches, a lot of poorly whirly, getting all fancy man, as Jim Rutherford would say. And he wasn't alone. He just it stands out the most with him because he's so capable. It's an identity thing. It's a character thing. It's a commitment thing. And look, they'll be quick to say that the work ethic is there. It's not an effort thing.

Right. It's a commitment to doing the things that make this team successful, which are hard to do. It's hard to pass up a backdoor pass and put the puck on the net. But that's what this team has to do to be successful.

They all know it. But for whatever reason, and I think some of it, as we've talked about before, is a little bit of a motivational dead zone coming into the season, knowing you're not going to play meaningful games until April. But there becomes a point where habits start to set in and become ingrained. And I think that's why Jordan Stahl was sitting at his locker the other night when we walked in. You know this, Adam, you've been around a long time in hockey. There are certain sort of ceremonial things that happen. There's a pomp and circumstance. And one of the signal events of the season is captain waiting at his locker to send a message to his fans, to his teammates, to the coaching staff. And that's the point that the Hurricanes reach after the Flyers loss where Jordan Stahl said enough.

I don't care what question they ask me. I've got something to say here. And obviously, the follow up questions tuned in on that. And then Rob Bryn Mawr basically saying, yep, he's right.

He knows that he built this culture. He knows when it's when it screwed up. So it was very much a come to Jesus moment for the Hurricanes. It helps that then they have a little bit of a break before the next game, I think, to regroup. But there's no question that things weren't as bad as fans thought they were in October.

But the fact that this has lingered into November has now become a matter of concern for the people inside the room. Something that you said here and I tried to impart on when I did the postgame podcast after the Flyers game and in conversations I have had either on the radio yesterday or just around the station here, is that the way Carolina plays their system is hard to do because it demands that players at some points, and you refer to it here, kind of go away from the instinct of trying to score and understand that the process of how we play, getting pucks behind the other team's net, like in the corners, behind the goal and working from there out, getting the defense to turn their back to the ice, all of that. That's the way this team, when they're on their game, that's the way it looks.

And they're playing from behind the other team. But it forces you to kind of not look at the goal sometimes and just understand if we get the puck in deep, we're going to create the mistakes, we'll create turnovers and we'll create opportunities. It's hard for players to play that way, especially when you know you get paid to score goals. Nages wants to score, right?

Ajo wants to score. So at times, his game has not been entirely there either. That's part of it. There's a part of sort of subsuming your creativity or your personal goals for the team. But another part of it is once you do that and you get the puck in there, you've got to go hit somebody and get it. It doesn't mean necessarily being big and physical, but it means being committed to going in there and making plays for the puck. And I think what Stahl's reacting to is not just sort of some of the loose play in the neutral zone with guys trying to make impossible passes instead of getting the puck deep. But also when the puck does go deep, are the Hurricanes really going after it with the same passion and commitment that they have to? I think there's been a little slippage there. And again, when you know you're going to make the playoffs, it's really hard to get up for a game against the Flyers in November. Here's the thing. I don't think we know.

This is what we'd like to think so. The Hurricanes have been on the other side of this a million times. When they sucked, they would win all their games and good teams when good teams got off their game and the Hurricanes caught them napping. The Hurricanes have been on the other side of that so many times this year. They're going to be fine, but they do have to correct the direction they're heading in if they're going to be fine.

And I think this is all part of a natural process of slogging it out for five months before you play games that really matter. My only counter that and I agree, ultimately, I think they will be fine. Two years ago, Florida was the best team in the NHL. Last year, they got in as the eighth team in the East, and it wasn't until pretty late into the regular season that they secured that last spot. They had to play well down the stretch to do that. I think Carolina will be fine. I think they can still win the division. But I think that it's almost like I would feel irresponsible if I went, oh yeah, playoffs aren't a problem. Right now, maybe not. And you kind of alluded to this as well. If this lingers, yeah, then it's going to be a problem. Yeah, then it becomes an issue.

It's not now. Here's the question I would ask you in response to that, though. Which team would you rather be in the 2022 and 2023 seasons when you look at the end results?

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Find Zicam in your local cold and flu aisle. I think this team is good enough. Real quick, when Rod mentioned I'll have to shake things up a bit, what is Rod talking about? Well, I think you mentioned it, or maybe Trip mentioned it, right after the game. He's already sort of tinkered with his lines more at this point in the season than he ever has. So I think we're going to see more of that. I think it means less assured ice time for guys who have come to count on it. You're going to see more, whoever it is, Jack Drury, Brendan Lemieux, Stefan Nason. Just because you spent your whole career in the top six and you scored a bunch of goals last year, I think some of that entitlement is going to start to be whittled out. Now, they haven't scored and they haven't produced.

But to me, the only line that's done its job consistently from start to finish, and it was put back together in suppliers, is Stahlfast and Martineau. They know what they are, they know what they have to do. They don't necessarily have the skill to finish the chances they create, but they're going to dominate you on possession and they're going to make it hard for you.

And they're going to end up with the predominance of the chances. But as good as KK has been, he's got to be better. Marte Neches. Aho, you mentioned his game is a wayward. Tabo scored great, but I'm not going to criticize Tabo Terevinen for scoring nine goals or whatever it is, but the fact that Tabo Terevinen only has one assist with his skill set suggests a global problem in terms of finishing chances that that line should create. And then Andrei Svechnikov clearly still working his way back in, although he's certainly got the offensive zone penalties down.

It's great to see that that important part of his game is back to full strength. He's got to be better, too. And there's a certain point where the training wheels have to come off him because this team isn't built to play with him at that level. We've seen the scoring droughts in the past. He's got to be better. You can talk about the Hurricanes not having superstars and that's fine, but they have good players who have to play well. And that includes Aho and Svechnikov and Neches and Terevinen and everybody else. Michael Bunting's got to score more.

He wasn't brought here to score 11 goals. So I think across the board, there are there's some entitlement that's going to turn into accountability that Rob Brindermore has been loath to do, because quite frankly, these guys over the last few years have earned that leash. But there's a point where you run out of leash. I think the Hurricanes have reached that point.

All right, let's we'll close on leash. Luke to cock of the News and Observer. Frank Reich took back the offensive play calling duties from Thomas Brown after three games because it looked so much worse apparently these three games than it did in the first six. I say that facetiously, obviously.

Yes. Is he coaching for his job the last day? I think that's probably already been decided. To me, it looks like Frank Reich is a bad fit for this group in this franchise. I don't know that that's his fault, but I think you can say that just as with we may come to say with the quarterback decision, the Panthers made the wrong decision, the coaching staff. And certainly when you look at the Panthers, there's nothing to suggest about their front office that they're good at making decisions.

Certainly when you look at David Tepper's real estate investments suggest he's lucky to be rich, not rich because he's smart. I think he's taking the play calling away from Thomas Brown as a favorite of Thomas Brown because he knows it's going to look terrible no matter who's doing it. So he might as well take the fall.

I think it's a favor for a friend who he respects. This ship is sinking. You might as well give the lifeboats to the people you like. So I don't think Frank Reich is coaching for his job. If they want to bring him back, that decision's already been made. If they realize they've made a horrible mistake, which I think probably Frank Reich feels right now that he made a horrible mistake taking the job, then that decision's already been made. The one thing we do know is this franchise is a hot mess. I wouldn't trust them to butter a piece of bread at this point. It's just whatever the Panthers do is wrong.

They're the opposite of King Midas. Very, very well said, Luke. I appreciate your time, man.

I'll see you over at the arena coming up. Yep, you got it, A.G. At Luke DeCock on Twitter or whatever we're calling it these days. Judy was boring. Hello. Then Judy discovered Chumbacasino.com.

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