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The Carolina Hurricanes picked up their third straight win yesterday, defeating the St. Louis Blues 6-4 on the road.
The Hurricanes put together a pretty decent first period and did have some great chances that were stopped by Jordan Binnington. However, the Blues managed to open the scoring on a power play 12 minutes into the frame, with Pavel Buchnevich burying a backdoor pass from Robert Thomas, as the Hurricanes trailed heading into the first intermission.
The Blues then extended the lead only a little over two minutes into the second period, as Noel Acciari made a nice move to open a lane and put a shot through Jaccob Slavin to beat Raanta.
However, Carolina cut the lead to one on a power play only a couple minutes later, as Brent Burns put a shot through traffic to beat Jordan Binnington. Then only 21 seconds after Burns’ goal, the Blues couldn’t clear the zone after a block and Jordan Martinook fired the puck on net through another screen from a good spot, tying the game. Carolina wasn’t done there either, as Seth Jarvis took a pass on the wing and his shot ramped off a stick and over Binnington, as the Hurricanes took the lead with their third goal in just 64 seconds.
Carolina ended up dominating the period, outshooting St. Louis 18-9, but the Blues managed to tie the game on another power play late in the frame, as Torey Krug took a pass heading towards the net and put a shot along the ice that got past Raanta.
Pyotr Kochetkov then entered the game for Carlina in the third period, in place of Raanta. Despite the fact that the Blues ended up outshooting Carolina pretty badly through much of the frame, with only about four minutes remaining, Jordan Martinook took the puck in the neutral zone and came down the wing to put a shot five-hole on Binnington, putting the Hurricanes ahead late. Jordan Staal then added an empty netter with only two minutes to go and while Ryan O’Reilly did end up getting one back for the Blues after that, Martinook was able to bury Carolina’s second goal on an empty net, securing a 6-4 win.
It was a pretty strong outing for the Hurricanes, outshooting the Blues 36-26 in the win. Those totals are pretty representative of who was controlling the play as well, with the Hurricanes generating many more quality chances than the Blues.
The key part of this was they weren’t just getting good chances, but were actually able to capitalize on them. This hasn’t been something we’ve seen a lot from Carolina this year and even if two goals did come from empty netters, it was nice to see the team scoring.
Obviously, it was a huge game for Martinook as well, managing his second career hat trick. Martinook has actually been producing at a really good pace for the team so far, with seven goals and 12 points already and it’s certainly a solid start, considering he’s typically a little more limited offensively.
After a slow start, Seth Jarvis is also turning things around, now riding a four-game point streak. Given Carolina’s lack of scoring this season, it’s an important development.
It’s also becoming more and more likely that Pyotr Kochetkov could be here to stay. Raanta hasn’t been great this year and couldn’t come up with timely saves yesterday. Unless an unreported injury had something to do with Raanta’s exit, it really seems like the team already has more faith in Kochetkov.
The team also activated Teuvo Teravainen from injured reserve today, so we'll see whether he'll be back in action tomorrow, when the Hurricanes face the Los Angeles Kings.
Carolina Hurricanes Blogger • 
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