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The Carolina Hurricanes remained undefeated last night, picking up a 4-1 win over the now 0-5 Montreal Canadiens.
The game marked forward Jesperi Kotkaniemi’s return to Montreal, after leaving the team via offer sheet this summer. It was certainly an eventful evening for him, starting with boos from the Montreal crowd.
Later in the night, however, Kotkaniemi scored his first goal with his new team, in the building where he spent the majority of the first three years of his NHL career.
The Hurricanes picked up the win in the end, but much of the attention surrounding the game focused on Kotkaniemi and helped to grow the newfound rivalry between the two teams.
Back in 2019, the Montreal Canadiens had tendered an offer sheet for then-restricted free agent Carolina Hurricanes forward Sebastian Aho. It was a bold move, marking the first time in six years that we’d seen an offer sheet. The Hurricanes matched, however, retaining their star forward and we kind of forgot about it for two years – but apparently, Hurricanes management didn’t.
This summer, the Hurricanes took the opportunity to retaliate, tendering an offer sheet to Kotkaniemi, who the Canadiens had selected third overall in 2018. This time, the offer sheet wasn’t matched.
We also can’t forget about some of the Hurricanes’ moves while this was happening, including adding a $20 signing bonus into Kotkaniemi’s contract (a nod to Sebastian Aho’s jersey number) and copying the statement that the Canadiens had released two years prior, upon tendering an offer sheet to Aho.
Then just before the season, it was reported that the Canadiens may have alerted the league that the Hurricanes hadn’t scheduled the required number of preseason games.
In booing Kotkaniemi in his return to Montreal, followed by the young forward picking up a goal against his former team, the rivalry only continues to grow.
It’s exciting to see, given that it seems increasingly rare that there are genuine rivalries at this point – certain teams who have interesting storylines between them. While the current playoff format is set in a way that should build rivalries, based on the higher likelihood of two teams playing each other in consecutive years, oftentimes it just feels like two teams who play against each other a lot, rather than a genuinely interesting storyline.
I look to the Toronto Maple Leafs and New York Islanders as an example of a newer kind of rivalry. With John Tavares heading to Toronto, there was genuine heat upon his return to New York and the games that followed. Given Lou Lamoriello went to the Islanders and has since helped to lead the team to success, while the Leafs still haven’t won a playoff series, the two teams are still compared today. These days, maybe more than ever, the off-ice transactions have a major role in building a new rivalry.
So we’ll see what comes next but as of now, it’s been entertaining to see the Hurricanes and Canadiens go at one another and it has built some excitement, leading up to them facing off against one another.
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OTHER ARTICLES FROM OCTOBER
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Hurricanes reveal opening night roster
New-look Hurricanes off to strong start 
Carolina Hurricanes Blogger • 
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