EDMONTON \u2014\u00a0Too fast, too organized, too good.<\/p>\n
Whatever it is that mysteriously stops this Carolina Hurricanes<\/a> system from winning enough playoff games clearly does not apply to one-off regular-season meetings, as the hottest team in the NHL cut through the Edmonton Oilers<\/a> like a hot knife through butter Friday in a 6-3 win.<\/p>\n The Oilers were totally outclassed on home ice, as Anaheim pulled five points clear of Edmonton atop the Pacific.<\/p>\n Two wins in eight games will do that to a team.<\/p>\n \u201cWe need to put together wins,\u201d said an exasperated head coach Kris Knoblauch, who is dangerously close to becoming that coach who just can\u2019t figure it out. \u201cWe’ve only got 20 games left, and we’re on the brink of not making playoffs.<\/p>\n \u201cWe can’t just wait to find our game in the playoffs, because we need to ultimately get there. So we need to find another gear.\u201d<\/p>\n Carolina outshot Edmonton 32-16 and outscored them two to one as well. It figures, as the Canes were at worst twice as good as Edmonton.<\/p>\n Edmonton has now allowed at least four goals in 10 of its past 12 games \u2014\u00a056 goals total in the past dozen outings. They are 5-7 in that span, which is surprisingly good, but the fact remains that Edmonton\u2019s defensive game is simply nowhere close to a level that could make the playoffs, let alone win series.<\/p>\n \u201cNobody wants to get scored against. We\u2019re not trying to go out there and trying to let in five every night,\u201d pleaded two-goal man Zach Hyman<\/a> after the game. \u201cThere\u2019s an effort there to be better. We\u2019ve talked about it, and it\u2019s just a matter of going out there and doing it \u2014 doing your job and trusting that the other guy is going to do their job.<\/p>\n \u201cI can\u2019t give you a magic answer, otherwise we wouldn\u2019t be 10 games allowing five goals a game or whatever it is. It\u2019s everything. It\u2019s lapses, I can\u2019t give you the answer because if I could, we\u2019d be doing it.\u201d<\/p>\n Edmonton broke in three new players in this game, all trade deadline week acquisitions: defenceman Connor Murphy<\/a> (minus-2), centre Jason Dickinson<\/a> (plus-1) and winger Colton Dach<\/a> (minus-3). None of the three had a point or a shot on goal, though Knoblauch thought the Dickinson line with Vasily Podkolzin and Kasperi Kapanen was his best unit.<\/p>\n The energy those new players provided was likely squared off by the learning curve and unfamiliarity of a trio of players wearing an Oilers jersey for the first time.<\/p>\n On the Hurricanes’ side, their only acquisition \u2014\u00a0tough winger Nick Deslauriers \u2014\u00a0wasn\u2019t even in town. So, Carolina had the same lineup playing that tightly organized Hurricanes system, though the locker room could not have been pleased with general manager Eric Tulsky\u2019s inactivity at the deadline.<\/p>\n \u201cI know there’s a lot of disappointment, I’m going to be honest,\u201d head coach Rod Brind\u2019Amour said before the game. \u201c(The players) were hoping to see us make a splash.\u00a0It’s tough. We’re one of the best teams in the league right now. Teams are making deals to try to catch us, and to try to catch the teams that are ahead of them, and that is us.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cOn one side, it would be nice to throw your chips in and see if you could improve your team,\u201d he said. \u201cBut we love the group we have.\u00a0 If you’re (making moves), it means you’re going to be disrupting that chemistry that I think we’ve done pretty well here. It’s behind us, and we’ve got to move on.\u201d<\/p>\n The Hurricanes are indeed one of the NHL\u2019s best regular-season teams, tops in the league with a 15-2-3 record in their previous 20 games. They are organized with excellent system play, and support each other better than any team we\u2019ve watched this season.<\/p>\n For whatever reason, it\u2019s a game plan that doesn\u2019t produce enough wins in the post-season. But in a one-off regular-season game, these Canes run a system that keeps them at or near the top of the tables most seasons.<\/p>\n Looming for Edmonton now is a killer road trip through Vegas, Colorado, Dallas and St. Louis (on a back-to-back) from which they could come home well out of touch with the top of the Pacific.<\/p>\n \u201cYou look at our division, and it\u2019s right there for us,\u201d Hyman said. \u201cThe optimism is that we\u2019re a team that has been to the Cup Final back-to-back. We\u2019re a really good team (with) the pieces that we\u2019ve added. It\u2019s just a matter of putting it together and doing it.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve got to try and not ride the roller coaster and believe in the processes and believe in the group we have.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"EDMONTON \u2014\u00a0Too fast, too organized, too good. Whatever it is that mysteriously stops this Carolina Hurricanes system from…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":519898,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194294],"tags":[49,48,23752],"class_list":{"0":"post-519897","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-edmonton","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-edmonton"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/519897","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=519897"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/519897\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/519898"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=519897"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=519897"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=519897"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}