After a Cane loss at home Thursday night versus Winnipeg that saw that Canes slow out of the gate and then slow throughout, the team looked for a better start and better effort overall in Boston Saturday. The Canes accomplished part 1 of that in spades. The Canes flew out of the gate and utterly dominated the 1st 10 minutes or so of the 1st period. The shot total early was 12-2, and the Canes got on the score board 1st with a Jiri Tlusty deflection after all 3 forwards on that line (EStaal and Boychuk the other 2) took a turn pushing a puck toward the net. It start with Eric Staal pulling the puck out of the corner. Then Boychuk tried to carry it to the front of the net. He ultimately lost it but managed to further it to Tlusty who then found Staal behind the net. The play ended with Staal finding Faulk creeping in from the point and firing a shot that Tlusty tipped in. Next the Canes earned a penalty and then another right on top of it to get 1:44 of 5-on-3 hockey. Unfortunately, I think this is where the game turned. The Canes wasted about 45 seconds of the 2-man advantage trying to enter the zone and keep possession. The last minute of it was very good and saw the Canes come real close to scoring multiple times with the best chance being a Nathan Gerbe whiff from close range. When the power play expired, you had to figure Boston had way better than they deserved being down only 1-0. And soon after it turned. A bad play by Andrej Sekera compounded with bad luck made it 1-1. Sekera half-fanned trying to whack a puck across the defensive zone to Justin Faulk. Griffith then intercepted and half-whiffed himself only to see the astray shot glance of Sekera's skate and past Ward. Then a little bit of loose coverage on Bergeron by Riley Nash gave Bergeron a chance to step into a shot that went through Ward and in late in the 1st period. At the end of the 1st period, the Canes were by far the better team and were somehow down 2-1. It wasn't fair, but that unfortunately is the game of hockey sometimes. You have to wonder how this game would have turned out if the Canes would have scored on the 5-on-3. The Bruins have been struggling lately, and you have to wonder if a horrible start and 2-0 deficit would have been enough to knock them fully off kilter on the way to a win. The 2nd and 3rd periods looked more like the Winnipeg game. The Bruins completely stymied the Canes offensively in the 2nd period, but did not score. The Canes did push back in the 3rd period, but it was too much of the odd angle/pushed to the outside harmless shot variety with not nearly enough traffic in front of the net variety.

So after a great 5-0-1 start to November, the Canes have now hit a bad stretch of 0-2. I think it is important to note that the current version of "bad" is nowhere near the level we saw on the West Coast trip. In consecutive games, the Canes have not had their best stuff for 60 minutes, but managed to hang around and have a chance to earn points in the 3rd period. The problem with the 2-game losing streak is more about how far below .500 the team fell in October such that a 5-2-1 stretch for November feels like it is not good enough.

A few player notes:

1) Justin Faulk. He has quietly become a points machine. In notching another assist, he now has 9 points (2G, 7A) in 9 games in November. I think the formula is pretty simple really. He is moving his feet in the offensive zone to make shooting lanes and throwing the puck toward the net whenever he can find a path to get it there.

2) Fancy stats. I think the stat for both Thursday and Saturday is the same. It is number of bodies in/around the crease when the puck arrives. It was striking how much more traffic Winnipeg and Boston put to the front of the net when shooting as compared to the Canes. I think it is a function of 3 things. First, the Canes tend to too easily get funneled to the outside in games like this which leaves only odd angle shots without traffic. Second, there are times where it looks like the Canes need to use every player they can just to even the scale in the puck battles such that when they do finally win it, there is no one left to be hanging out in front of the net. Finally, it just is not the Canes strength. You can see where Peters is pushing for this and getting more of it. One notable play was a shift in the 3rd where the Canes hemmed in the Bruins and Chris Terry stayed and stayed in front of the net. But the Canes roster is not naturally full of players who get their points by winning battles in front of the net, so they are at a disadvantage in games where the goalies are good and the scoring is not going to come from just flat beating them.

3) Top players. Eric Staal was not terrible. And he did net a nice assist on the Tlusty goal. But as the game wore on Patrice Bergeron and his line were better and more consistent. They also netted a goal by Bergeron and kept Eric Staal to a fairly quiet night even minus his usual tough matchup against Zdeno Chara.

4) A break away. I guess you could argue that the Canes did get their 1 break when a Bruins goal was disallowed in the 3rd period on a phantom goalie interference call, but in general the Canes have not caught a break in the form of a fluke goal or anything in 2 consecutive games. They were only 1 of those away from a better ending twice, so I guess the positive spin is that despite losing twice in a row, the team has continued to stay in hockey games even against tough style matchups and good competition.

Unlike the past 2, this is not going to be a great week when it is over. 2-2 is not horrible, but with 3 home games and the task of making up for October still not complete, you would hope to be plus for the week. But tomorrow's game against San Jose is still a big swing game. If your good weeks are 2-0-1 and your bad weeks are 2-2, that is a playoff type pace. If your good weeks are 2-0-1 and your bad weeks are 1-3 (or worse in October) that is a recipe for finishing in the bottom 10 in the league. Tomorrow's game decides that math for the Canes. For the 2nd consecutive weekend, the Canes catch a back-to-back where they actually have a slight advantage physically. San Jose played tonight, so they have more of the normal back-to-back whereas the Canes should have been back home in Raleigh for late dinner and an early bedtime.

Twitter=@CarolinaMatt63

Go Canes!

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