Time is NOW for Carolina Hurricanes to make some moves

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Just call it what it is. The team is just flat out bad. And don't worry, I'm going to dive in more at one o'clock about the Carolina Panthers.

But I also want to get into another one of the pro sports teams here in the state of North Carolina. The Carolina Hurricanes. You want to talk about a team that's struggling? Struggling. Four straight losses.

Four times. Yeah, hard times for sure. Four straight losses for the Carolina Hurricanes on their road trip up in Canada right now. They're back in action tomorrow against the Ottawa Senators. But on Saturday night, for those who may have stayed up for Canes after dark when the Canes were in Vancouver, the Canes lost 4-3 on the road at Vancouver. Now Vancouver is a very good hockey team, so I'm not trying to put anything down on Vancouver. I'm talking just specifically about the Canes right here. But at what point, at what point does Rob Brind'Amour get to the point where he takes one of his top stars and benches them?

At what point is Rob going to get to that? Because we've heard after multiple games, after the game against Calgary last week, after the game against Edmonton, dudes getting called out by Rob Brind'Amour in the media. Now he didn't name specific names, but he said, paraphrasing here, some guys aren't pulling their weight.

Yeah. And it's multiple guys. Even Stefan Naesen said, one of the forwards for the team said, some guys aren't pulling their weight.

Some guys aren't fully bought in. At what point are you going to maybe take one of those guys and sit them up in the press box during a game? Because I will say this right now, on Saturday, watching that game, to do some stuff covering the team as well, Martin Neches, man. I know Rob Brind'Amour isn't going to say names out in the public. I mean, he's not at that point. I don't think he ever will be.

I mean, Rod's a former player. I think he gets it. But at what point is Martin Neches going to sit up in the press box? Up where you and I sit, Graham, for games? Like, when's he going to sit up there? Like, you know what?

You're going to sit this one out. There may be some hesitation just because of how Neches can still be a playmaker. He has those abilities, but... He does, but when's he doing it? That's the question.

Here's the thing. If you can't be trusted defensively in Rod Brind'Amour's system, Rod ain't going to play you. Because there's a couple of goals that were given up.

I can directly tie to Martin Neches in Saturday's game against Vancouver. In particular, the second goal. The second goal of the game, the puck is in the corner to the right of Ante Rata, who was in goal. The puck was all the way down in the right corner. And Martin Neches is standing right next to the goal, next to a Vancouver player. Standing directly right next to him. Makhayev was the one who was standing next to him. He's just standing right there next to him. And Elias Pettersson just throws the puck from the corner directly in front of the goal.

Right to Makhayev, who just taps it in. No defensive effort. Martin Neches didn't even try to tie a guy up. Didn't even try. Like, you're not even going to lift up his stick. You're not even going to put a body on him. Just stood next to him and let's him tap it in.

It's like, dude, what are you trying to do here? He might as well shouldn't have even been standing there, is my point. And then on the third goal of the game, whereas JT Miller comes in. He skates right between Neches and Mike Bunting.

Just skates right past the two of them. Wide open in the slot. One time shot goal. Like, that's the thing. There are multiple goals tied up to him.

I get it. 3 on 3 in overtime. You got all this speed and space to work with. It's electrifying to watch you in OT. But how often is that happening? Like, you're playing 5 on 5 way more than you're playing on 3 on 3 in overtime. Like, he's not been good at all this season. Martin Neches has not been good at all this season. Like, yeah, he's got tons of skill and tons of ability.

He's got all the physical tools. But I don't think he just fits into what they're trying to do there. And there's a reason why he hasn't gotten a long-term contract from the Carolina Hurricanes. There's a reason why.

There's a reason why Svech and Aho have gotten long-term deals. There's a reason why Neches hasn't. Rob Brindamore talked after the game, just kind of giving his takeaways from the loss to Vancouver on Saturday. Well, third was great. You know, I think they had, I don't know how many shots. Didn't feel like they were on our end. And fortunately, their best player there, one of their best players got us, you know, on a nice individual effort. But we can't, you know, I mean, we gave them two goals. You know, just lack of coverage, just standing there watching the guy tap it in and shoot. That can't happen against any team, especially a good team, you know, that knows how to play and plays hard. The game, you know, after the first, we took some penalties there. That was not ideal. I thought that kind of put us on our heels. And then after that, I thought the game was just kind of back and forth, not much going on. And then I thought we had a good third. But like I said, you can't give them two goals. So yeah, there it is. Talking about, yeah, lack of coverage. We stood there and watched the guy tap one in. That's you, Martin Neches. Like that's him basically saying Neches' name without saying Neches' name. Not sticking to your assignment, which is one thing, bring the board.

It's not your assignment. It's just, it's effort. It's just effort. Like he was in the right spot. Like he knew, okay, there's an open guy in front of the net.

I need to be there. But where's the effort to actually tie him up? Where's the physicality needed? I mean, if you took a penalty right there, Neches, to prevent a goal, you're 100% okay with it. That's the right time to take a penalty.

Yeah, it's perfectly fine. It's things like that. But get to the game-winning goal. So Carolina actually early on in the third period did tie the game 3-3. Stefan Neeson, who I mentioned a little bit earlier, ended up getting the game-tying goal.

So 3-3. That's a really good third period overall on Saturday. But Ronta led in a softy of a game-winning goal. And it was only about a minute and a half after. Or so it's about a minute and a half after Neeson tied things 3-3. It was Pederson, who I mentioned earlier, just skating. Aho was skating with him behind the net. He just does like a little wrap around. And Ronta wasn't there to make the save.

He was just a bad goal that was led in. Which gets me to the next thing. This team needs goaltending help massively. ASAP. As soon as possible. All I want for Christmas is for the Hurricanes to acquire a goaltender. We might need to start making a Christmas wishlist for sports teams here in the state of North Carolina.

We might do that actually at some point in the coming weeks. But you look at some of the advanced stats and advanced numbers and things like that. Based on the scoring chances for Vancouver, the Canucks should have only scored based off the advanced stats. Their expected goal number was 2.61. They scored 4. Carolina's expected goal number was 3.21.

They scored 3. So they're right there where they need to be in terms of scoring. But the goaltending right now is below average.

And I'm not sure the team really has a lot of confidence in these guys right now. Because right now, Ronta playing below average. Piotr could check off playing below average.

When Freddie Anderson was healthy before he had his blood clotting issue. He was playing about average. And guess what? That's all this team needs. This team just needs average goaltending. Because they don't give up a whole lot of scoring opportunities. They don't give up a lot of high quality shots. And they just need a goalie to be average.

That's it. And they can't even get average. The Canes literally have like the worst save percentage in the entire NHL. The worst. Like, you can't get any worse than that. I guess it could be worse.

You could lower that number even further. But you're dead last. Or you're one of the worst in the NHL.

Like that's simple as that. So it's another close loss for the Carolina Hurricanes. Here's Rob Brittanemore talking about what the conversation is like after another close loss.

You know it's, I don't know, it's tough. Because you got to play 60 minutes. And like I said, when you just give a goal here or there. Right now we don't have that margin.

So that's been the interesting thing. But at the end of the day too, we got to get more out of some of our guys. Our top guys are not, I don't think they're scoring. They're not really contributing offensively. Which is making it hard, you know. So, I like the third though. That was, you know, we dug in.

And, you know, just didn't get it. I'm happy. Don't want to say happy. I'm glad that they're going through this now at this point in the season. Before game 30.

As opposed to game like 60. Yeah. You know. As opposed to we're still trying to figure things out. Or you hit the bad stretch.

You hit the skids. You know, at game 60. You know, right around the trade deadline and all that kind of stuff. Much rather than deal with this stuff now.

Figure it out now. So when they get to the back half of the season. They can really start to elevate their game. And have that crescendo going into the playoffs. Because sometimes we see teams that are hot from the early jump.

And they kind of just sort of average and, you know. Kind of sputter their way into the playoffs. I'd much rather be the team that struggles a little bit early.

Figures it out. And then, you know, accelerates going into that. Go into the playoffs full steam ahead. Because if you look at the standings in the NHL right now. When it comes to Carolina, the Metropolitan Division. They're right up there. That Metropolitan Division is stacked this season.

It is not going to be easy. Because if you look at the Metropolitan Division right now. Carolina actually, believe it or not. If the season were to start today.

Would actually be out of the playoffs. But luckily for the Carolina Hurricanes that's not the case. Right now they are 6th in the Metropolitan Division with 29 points. Actually, they're the same number of points as the New Jersey Devils. But the Devils have played one less game than Carolina has. But the Rangers right now above and beyond everyone else with 39 points. Carolina has 29. So they still got to jump the Devils, the Islanders, the Caps and the Flyers.

All those other teams I mentioned. The Flyers, Caps, Islanders, Devils. Those 4 teams that are above Carolina in the standings.

It's only 3 points. Flyers are 2nd in the division with 32. Carolina is just 3 points behind them.

That's it. Like that's how tight of a race it is in the Metropolitan Division. It is going to be a grind this entire season. Whatever the Carolina Hurricanes need to do to get a point on...

Even just a point on Tuesday against the Ottawa Senators. They need just one. They need just one. Just get a point. Obviously you'll take two. But can we just get just one? Just one please. You need some sparkle of success.

Which every way you can get it. They need something that's going to jump start them. They need a little juice. I know Andrei Svechnikov has missed the last couple games because of an upper body injury. But it's not like he was lighting it up. You know before his injury. Only had one goal this whole season.

Coming back from his knee injury that he suffered late last season. So a lot of things still need to be worked out with this Carolina Hurricanes team. And I'm wondering are we going to get to the point where Rob Brendamore says. Hey you.

Neches. Go sit and watch this one. At what point is trying to figure it out. No longer going to cut it. When are Jurassic movies going to have that start being made. At some point he's going to have to make that decision. Thanks for watching. P-U-L-S-E.com