CAROLINA HURRICANES NEWS CLIPPINGS • February 25, 2021 It’s just a few fans to start, but we’re taking first steps back to sports as we knew it By Luke DeCock Starting March 4, that will change. Three thousand or so fans won’t push the Carolina It won’t be the same as 18,000-plus packed in, but it’ll be a Hurricanes any closer to profitability. Entertaining that many better environment than the eight home games so far, when fans at PNC Arena might push the Hurricanes closer to the the players’ wives and kids have done most of the cheering. playoffs. Some of those who will have the opportunity to go still won’t With a $78 million payroll, not to mention the fixed costs of feel comfortable, and that’s fine. We’re all going to have to opening PNC Arena no matter how many fans are in the feel our way through the reopening process, just as we’ve all building, that much ticket revenue isn’t going to make a huge felt our way through everything for the past year. The difference to the bottom line. But even that many people fortunate vaccinated have another reason to count could create the kind of atmosphere that gives the themselves lucky. The rest of us will continue to do the Hurricanes an actual home-ice advantage, the kind of thing constant calculus of risk and reward in our heads. that could push a contending team over the top against last year’s Stanley Cup finalists. “We still have these capacity requirements,” Cooper said, “because we know that the virus is still here.” In a division where all but two other teams have had fans in the building from the start, Gov. Roy Cooper’s All of this is, and has been, and will continue to be, a process announcement Wednesday that indoor arenas can open to fraught with uncertainty and peril, like feeling for a power 15 percent of capacity -- based on PNC’s listed capacity for outlet in the dark. But the state’s coronavirus numbers are hockey, that would be 2,802 fans -- allows the Hurricanes to starting to move in the right direction, and getting to watch a keep up with everyone but the Chicago Blackhawks and sporting event in person again is one of the rewards as they Detroit Red Wings in terms of atmosphere. do. Eleven months after the ACC booted fans from its tournament overnight as COVID-19 announced its presence It’s just a few fans to start, at PNC and elsewhere in North with authority, the doors are finally reopening. Carolina, but it’s the first step back toward sports as we knew it. That’s true across the Triangle, where there might actually be UNC students at the Smith Center for the second Duke- Financially, Hurricanes owner Tom Dundon said Wednesday Carolina game on March 6, or N.C. State fans at PNC for the it’s a break-even proposition for the Hurricanes, at best, but Wolfpack’s final home game that same day against Virginia there are other benefits for the team. Tech. (Duke which has allowed neither students nor player families nor media into Cameron this season, will hold that “You stay connected with the fans,” Dundon said. “I think any line.) player you talk to says it’s a lot easier to get into the game when there’s fans, even if there’s just a few. It feels more like If being indoors with a bunch of people doesn’t sound right what it’s supposed to feel like. It’s that intangible. It’s more quite yet, the Durham Bulls open April 6 and the Carolina that -- the atmosphere, the aura.” Mudcats in May. The NWSL is scheduled to resume play in mid-May. At 30 percent there will be plenty of space to Never mind the cruel irony that the Hurricanes have their spread out. most watchable team in 15 years, off to the best start since the 2006 Stanley Cup champions, and a grand total of 25 At the rate North Carolina is progressing in the fight against people (plus families and media and staff) have actually COVID, with masks and vaccines doing what they’re been able to watch in person. For a market that suffered supposed to do, restrictions inside and outside might even through so many terrible, lost years -- and by and large be loosened further by then. Maybe even by the time the people still went to the games, until the very end of the NHL playoffs start in May -- when fans in the building will dismal decade -- this timing was terrible, for team and fans really matter. alike. CAROLINA HURRICANES NEWS CLIPPINGS • February 25, 2021 Hurricanes fall to Lightning again as Tampa Bay’s Vasilevskiy notches the shutout By Chip Alexander But Vasilevskiy was better and at his best in the third, when the Canes had 16 scoring chances, according to the Natural The Tampa Bay Lightning played like the defending Stanley Stat Trick analytics site. Cup champion Wednesday, which was not a good thing for the Carolina Hurricanes. “I think our starts are what’s been killing us the last couple of games,” Canes captain Jordan Staal said. “It’s hard to come Tampa Bay scored two goals in the first period. The back in this league, especially against one of the best. We Lightning had Andrei Vasilevskiy in net, looking the part of a did get some chances toward the end of the second and the goalie who has been a Vezina Trophy winner in the NHL. third and created some plays, but it’s too little, too late Tampa Bay’s defense was sound and physical, limiting sometimes. We need a better start.” Carolina’s chances and forcing Canes coach Rod Brind’Amour to completely reshuffle his lines in the third Staal said the Canes worked hard in the game but added, period. “The other part is being mentally ready and being aware of the plays they have and the players they have and what their The end result was a 3-0 victory by the Lightning and a tendencies are, and I think we slipped on that at the start. second straight win over the Hurricanes (12-5-1), who now They made us pay like good teams do.” have lost two in a row for the first time this season. For Vasilevskiy, who had 25 saves, it was his first shutout of the A blown defensive assignment allowed Tampa Bay season and 22nd of his career. defenseman Victor Hedman, who never seems to tire, to skate through the zone with the puck, around the net and Asked about the the wholesale line changes, Brind’Amour find Colton open in front of the crease for his goal. On the said the Canes had “zero traction” with the lines and needed power play, Gourde’s pass in transition found Coleman an overhaul. unmarked in the slot. And about that first period. In a repeat of Monday’s 4-2 loss “The whole package has to be there from everybody if we to Tampa Bay at PNC Arena, the Canes meandered through want to be the best,” Staal said. most of the opening period as Ross Colton scored his first NHL goal and Blake Coleman added a power-play goal for Brind’Amour in the third took Andrei Svechnikov off Tampa Bay (12-4-1). Sebastian Aho’s line and moved Martin Necas and Jordan Martinook to the line. Vincent Trocheck centered Svechnikov Why the two poor first-period starts? and Jesper Fast, and Staal had Nino Niederreiter and Brock “The Tampa Bay Lightning,” Brind’Amour said. McGinn on the wings. That was it, the whole answer. Alex Nedeljkovic, who shut But Vasilevskiy stopped everything. He made a timely pad out the Lightning 4-0 on Saturday, gave up the two first- save on Warren Foegele midway through the third and period goals Wednesday — the third, by Barclay Goodrow stopped Foegele again minutes later. The Lightning, was an empty-netter at the end — and kept the Canes within Brind’Amour said, “sat back” defensively in the third, content striking distance with some good stops. to clear the zone and put sticks on sticks anywhere near the net. Nedeljkovic denied Tampa Bay’s Steven Stamkos on a point- blank shot and Yanni Gourde on a shorthanded attempt The Canes and Lightning go at it again Thursday to complete during the game. He finished with 25 saves and was sharp their string of four consecutive games. enough. “No excuses to be made for why we can’t play the full 60 “He kept us in there,” Brind’Amour said. minutes,” Canes defenseman Jaccob Slavin said. “It’s just a matter of doing it. You’ve got to dig in harder.” CAROLINA HURRICANES NEWS CLIPPINGS • February 25, 2021 LeBrun: Canadiens coaching change, Rod Brind’Amour extension talks, NHL Draft update By Pierre LeBrun Canadiens bench with interim head coach Dominique Ducharme to help out the first-time NHL head coach. We’ll never know how differently it could have worked out. The latter is certainly not going to happen. Four years ago, Claude Julien and Gerard Gallant could have potentially swapped respective hirings and who knows I talked to Gallant recently, before any of this happened in exactly what that would have meant today. Montreal, and asked him about whether he’d join an NHL bench in an associate role if it presented itself.