The NHL column: The Eastern Conference’s two “Team Finland” celebrate Christmas in different moods – Carolina is a champion candidate, Florida risks missing the playoffs

The Eastern Conference’s “Finnish team”, Carolina and Florida, were among the league’s favorites before the season. The Hurricanes machinery coughed, but just in time for Christmas, the team has found the flow. Panthers, on the other hand, have to watch out for Krampus.

In this week’s episode, the NHL podcast turns inside out on the Carolina Hurricanes and New York Rangers. In addition, there will be some talk about the New Jersey Devils.

The team and the fans in Carolina were able to open the first package of Christmas on the night of Wednesday Finnish time. In the prestigious meeting between the teams tied for first place in the Metropolitan division, the Hurricanes took a clear 4-1 victory despite New Jersey leading the game.

Many times Carolina has dominated the shooting statistics, but the victories have been sweaty one-goal victories – often after overtime. Now the Devils shot almost twice as many shots on goal and were also more restrained in the tackling game. Nevertheless, the visitors were behind the whole time.

It took Jesperi Kotkaniemi just 20 seconds into the game’s first substitution to give the home team the lead. The goal underlined the feeling of early Christmas: Kotkaniemi, who had such a hard time finding efficiency despite a lot of toil, represented a real goal of will.

Now, after a couple of promising games in a newly composed attacking trio with Teuvo Teräväinen and Seth Jarvis, it was the team’s intended second center that showed the way.

“A signature moment for Kotkaniemi in Carolina,” the team’s longtime television commentator Tripp Tracy exclaimed live.

Add that the sensational goalkeeper Pyotr Kotjetkov, who got his chance thanks to Frederik Andersen’s injury, acted as a living wall – and not for the first time. The 23-year-old is starting to look more and more like the savior keeper the organization has been dreaming of for years.

With the turn of the year and the halfway point of the regular season approaching, has Rod Brind’Amour’s gang of work heroes suddenly got all the pieces in place?

A producing second center, a winning goaltender – who doesn’t break down easily – and a game-wise slightly unfair victory here and there in the middle of the series. Pretty much exactly what coach Rod mentioned in his letter to Korvatunturi.

That Brent Burns would turn out to be such a dominating game engine on the blue line that everyone expected, he had been confirmed well in advance of the Christmas holiday.

Aho and Pacioretty

Carolina has won seven straight games without its No. 1 center and longtime leading scorer, moving up to first in the division and second in the league.

Sebastian Aho doesn’t usually miss many games and, starting from his second season in Carolina, has always been a driving player when things went well for the Hurricanes. Now he’s been out for half a dozen games – and Carolina has won them all.

Often it was Aho who scored a long-awaited late equalizing goal, or put that winning puck in the cage. Since the 2017-2018 season, Aho has scored 35 winning goals for the “Canes”. The second, third and fourth in the team statistics have accounted for a total of 40 decisive goals.

Incidentally: with 35 “game winning goals” in six seasons, Aho is tied for sixth in the league. Brad Marchand and Aho are tied – closely followed by David Pastrnak and Sidney Crosby. Connor McDavid, Leon Draisaitl and Auston Matthews are the top trio.

Says something about how to value Aho’s importance to the Carolina Hurricanes.

With Aho gone, the Hurricanes squad has clearly shown that the team has impressive breadth and depth – and character. Plus, there’s still more to come from the Hurricanes’ as-yet-untapped reserves.

Mainly the eyes are directed towards Max Pacioretty. The former Montreal Canadiens captain was a surgical precision acquisition to turn the Hurricanes into a team that doesn’t have too much trouble getting the puck into the goal. Right now, the “Canes” are only sixth in the Metropolitan for goals scored.

Pacioretty is a reliable scorer: six times he has scored between 30 and 39 goals. Thus every season since the start of 2010–2011 that he has been able to play at least 70 games.

His Carolina debut won’t be available until about a month from now, while Aho should make a comeback after the short Christmas break. There are good reasons in the Hurricanes camp to celebrate Christmas with good spirits and high expectations for the coming spring.

Gloomy autumn for the Panthers

For the Florida Panthers, Christmas isn’t as much fun. The team, with three Finnish centers, was the best in the regular season last season. The day before Christmas Eve, the Panthers are in position twelve out of sixteen in the Eastern Conference and have three teams and six points between them and the last wild card spot.

The “Panthers” dominated last season with an offensive whirlwind game and scored well over 300 goals. The team’s Achilles’ heel was still a properly leaky defense, which was not improved by the fact that the intended first keeper Sergej Bobrovkskij did not live up to expectations.

The local rival Tampa Bay Lightning humiliated the Panthers in the playoffs and that led to action. Out went the inexperienced coach Andrew Brunette and in came the mighty experienced Paul Maurice. The intention was that the Panthers would become a tighter pack. Difficult to face.

Out also went club icon Jonathan Huberdeau and first pair defender MacKenzie Weegar. Both became total extras against tough Tampa and received harsh criticism. In came Matthew Tkachuk, who maintains a Huberdeau level in production and is a physically determined player.

Thinking quickly, it looked like Maurice’s routine of organizing the game and the lighter fluid that Tkachuk carries with him in his player identity was just what the hockey doctor ordered.

It leaks in its own end

Something that general manager Bill Zito still did not address was the Panthers’ running backs. In addition, Bobrovsky leaks like a sieve as usual – with an annual salary of 10 million dollars. And the man of the future Spencer Knight is still only 21 years old. He can’t pull the load.

You understand that the situation with Bobrovsky is extremely difficult to resolve. Zito’s predecessor signed the idiot contract that runs until the spring of 2026 – and in addition to the keeper being outrageously expensive, he has a clause that prevents trades.

However, it is difficult to understand how Zito reasons regarding the back squad. The defensive game was bad last year. It was simply because the squad was among the worst in the league when it came to defending. Now it is even worse.

Presumably, Zito and his team felt that the fault was not the plays, but the system. There he was simply wrong – behind superstar Aaron Ekblad, Gustav Forsling and Brandon Montour, the back line is on the verge of lousy. No one can organize it to defend strongly.

To top it all off, the star defenseman Ekblad in the five-on-five game is inside more often when the puck ends up in his own net than when Florida celebrates. Not the best possible chief in defense.

Really hard to understand how Zito didn’t offer defensively strong Petteri Lindbohm a continuation. Instead, he brought in the extremely sluggish 35-year-old Marc Staal, who in today’s NHL is in the wrong environment. Lindbohm would not have been more expensive, but rather more useful.

Captain’s responsibility

Jonathan Huberdeau thus had to steer the kitty away from Florida after the flop against Tampa. In the name of honesty, it must still be highlighted that team captain Aleksander Barkov also did not measure up when the “Bolts” played playoff hockey.

Barkov’s autumn has not been good – a real surprise. Admittedly, injuries and viruses have done their part to complicate the situation. But even when Barkov has been in full playing condition, production has been more modest than expected.

The puck simply does not seem to be “Sasha’s” friend in the same way that we have become used to seeing. Of course, the in-depth statistics still love Barkov and he is very much right.

But still: the shooting percentage is an abysmal 7.3, Barkov has lost many games in the matchup against other first centers – and the intended success axis Barkov-Tkachuk is still waiting to start working. And how has Tkachuk affected Barkov in the role of team leader?

Are there any kind “Panthers” here?

Of course, there is still time to change course and be at your best as the playoffs approach. The Panthers have the highest expected number of goals of all 32 teams and are clear first in both shots on goal and dangerous chances.

The offensive side is thus, at least in theory, in last year’s form – it’s just a matter of getting dividends.

However, it is a stark reality that only nine teams conceded more goals than the Panthers. It’s also a cold fact that the Atlantic division’s three straight playoff teams are already nailed down – Boston, Toronto and Tampa won’t be overtaken.

One of the two wild card spots is thus the best Florida can achieve. Even that will require a long final sprint from now until the final regular season game. It was certainly not what Paul Maurice would bring as a coach.

The Panthers simply need to post throughout the rest of the season. Almost so that a little help from Santa Claus is needed. Hope the GM, coach, captain and the rest of the gang have been kind. The risk exists because it is Krampus who knocks.

Thanks for reading – have a very Merry Christmas!

Sources: nhl.com, naturalstattrick.com, hockeydb.com