If you could pick a couple games per year where you could guarantee a win, the New Year's Eve tradition would easily be one of them. A win just makes for better festivities on a celebration type night. So it was great to see the good guys do their part at the RBC Center.

While the game was not a barrel of holiday excitement it was solid and pretty tight in Paul Maurice form. This was in stark contrast to the last Thrasher win that got wild, loose, sloppy and wide open before a Staal hatter made it end well.

For better or worse, the Canes are taking on Paul Maurice form. After having the same coach for years and years and then seeing a dramatic change in mentality to Laviolette, seeing and hearing from Maurice again makes it even clearer the difference. Regardless of the line of questioning during the intermission or post-game interviews, Maurice always comes back to the defensive fundamentals with comments like either "we limited them to 5 shots and only 1-2 chances" or "we gave up too many chances", etc., etc. So playing to the new model of Canes hockey, Wednesday's game was a solid one. The team gave up limited shots and even more limited quality chances. And the defense did a tremendous job cleaning up pucks around the crease when Ward was fighting the puck a bit in the 3rd period. And the result was a tight, sound 3-1 win.

First, a few positive notes on a generally good win:

1) Playing to the system. (See above) Unlike the wild win over Atlanta a few games back, the team played to the system very well last night. One of my gripes about the 08-09 Laviolette-coached Canes was that there just seemed to be no consistent winning formula that could be repeated. The team had a few stretches where they scored bunches of goals in wide open games. Then the team hit a stretch where it put the clamps on defensively and won tight games. Etc., etc.

2) The 4th line. Bayda/Sutter/Eaves (was Larose for awhile) continues to be a bright spot. Eaves came within inches of a goal on the shot that slipped through Lehtonen. More significantly, the tandem consistently got the puck deep, stayed out of trouble and created more offense than they gave up. That is exactly what you want from a 4th line.

3) Good night on a tough night. Games like Wednesday's are maddeningly difficult for goalies. Ward mostly had nothing to do for long stretches but his team did not build much of a cushion which left Ward waiting for a few chances here and there to make a good thing turn bad. I thought he fought the puck quite a bit in the 3rd period especially early, but the defense cleaned up the crease time and again, and Ward did his job giving up only 1 goal.

4) Another solid effort from #33. Anton Babchuk entered 08-09 much like 06-07. He started as a depth defenseman, then found ice time due to injuries and started okay but not overly impressive. But in 06-07 with more ice time and continued injury problems, Babchuk played his way to more minutes and for a stretch of hockey in January-February was arguably the Canes best defenseman before the AHL debacle due to numbers when players came back from injury. He seems to again be gaining momentum heading into winter and is providing solid minutes and even some offense right now.

5) Samsonov. He has now been clipping along at a 60-65 point pace for about 20 games now since the horrendous start. While it is unlikely that he will make up for the first 18 games stat-wise, 45 more games of the current pace is exactly what the Canes hoped for when the team re-signed him.

I am obviously happy with the holiday win, the 2 points in the standings and the effort/quality of play that made the Canes the better team. I am becoming a bit concerned with 2 things:

1) The more shots trap. The bad ending to the first Maurice run ended with strings of games where the Canes outshot the other team but always seemed to run into a hot goalie. Those who tuned out the familiar reprise from quotes and announcers partly saw a different story. The Canes conservative style meant a lot of offensive zone time trying to win pucks behind the net, and it also meant few rushes or real high quality chances. Mo re so, the team entered the zone 2-on-2 or 3-on-3 with little to do but throw the puck at the net again. When you go through the Bruins and Thrashers games (and others), the shot totals look fine, but for the most part (especially in the Bruins game), the Canes were taking what little they had and trying to turn low-percentage situations into goals. Against NHL goaltenders, you just do not get too many this way.

2) BrindAmour. I commented many times this season that BrindAmour just clearly was not healthy. After a stretch of playing better hockey the past few weeks and maybe finally getting closer to 100% health, he took a step back in the Bruins game on Sunday playing a part in 2 bad turnovers that led directly to goals and to some degree took another step back Wednesday night. The Kovalchuk goal came after BrindAmour guessed incorrectly on a cross ice passing leaving half the ice for Kovalchuk to dance, assess the situation and fire a laser for a goal. Again shorthanded, BrindAmour came within a couple feet of handing the puck over right between the circles when he suddenly flung the puck from a non-dangerous place on the wall to the middle of the ice without a Cane there.

My assessment is that BrindAmour's early struggles were mostly driven by physical limitations. He just did not seem capable of changing directions, stopping/starting or anything else except gliding on his twice-operated-on knee early on. But more recently BrindAmour has been plagued by decision-making, confidence type of issues which is a completely different thing and a concern. Here is hoping he can fight his way out of the rut soon because he just has not been a solid #2 playoff team type center. As a huge Rod BrindAmour fan, it pains me to say this, but that is the truth.

Happy New Year Canes fans! Here is hoping we get playoffs again in 2009!

Go Canes!

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