Hurricanes suffer 5-4 loss to Blue Jackets

Peter Koutroumpis, Triangle Sports Network
Peter Koutroumpis, Triangle Sports Network

RALEIGH, N.C. – The Carolina Hurricanes began their preseason schedule falling short in a 5-4 loss to the Columbus Blue Jackets in front of a modest crowd of 8,178 in attendance at PNC Arena on Wednesday.

Alexander Semin led Carolina’s offense scoring two goals while Eric Staal and Jeremy Welsh each added one apiece while goaltender Cam Ward played a full 60 minutes, stopping 26 shots in the losing effort.

Coming into the game, head coach Kirk Muller emphasized that evaluating personnel was going to be a focus while continuing to work to pare down the team’s roster which was reduced by 12 players to 35 just two hours before the puck dropped.

“I think first game, I was expecting a little bit more bite to our game,” Muller said.

“When I say playing hard, it’s not just physically finishing checks. I thought we had a group tonight that we could’ve been tougher to play against. You’re gonna’ get a little fatigued the first game.”

Semin scored his first goal of the preseason at 6:51 in the first period taking a snap shot from the left faceoff dot in the Columbus zone that beat Blue Jackets keeper Curtis McElhinney with Michal Jordan being credited with the assist on the goal.

It didn’t take Columbus long to tie the score as Marian Gaborik wrapped the puck around the boards to Tim Erixon who looked to shoot, but instead found a wide-open Boone Jenner who one-timed a shot into an open net as Ward was caught out of position on the play.

The Blue Jackets took the lead with 1:23 remaining in the period when Brandon Dubinsnky gained the zone along the right boards, spun around and fed a pass in the high slot to Nikita Nikitin who looked to shoot, but found Gaborik open to Ward’s left and finished the play by tucking the puck high and over the keeper’s glove.

The Blue Jackets carried a 2-1 lead into the first intermission even while being outshot by the Hurricanes 15-7.

“I thought it was a pretty good pace,” Hurricanes forward Jeff Skinner said.

“I think that’s what you’re gonna’ expect though, the first preseason game for us. You want to see the effort there. There’s gonna’ be some mistakes early. You can deal with the mistakes when guys are workin’ hard.”

Carolina got back on the board and tied it up early in the second period on a beautiful no-look pass from Chris Terry in the right corner as he found Jeremy Welsh whose backhander tied the score 2-2 at 2:55.

Welsh wanted the puck and got his teammate’s attention accordingly.

“I yelled at Terry pretty loud,” Welsh said.

“He heard me, so he hit me with it. It was a great pass. I actually thought that I would maybe turn around and not shoot it because there was a D-man comin’, but I was sorta’ lucky it got through a couple of legs.”

Semin then scored his second of the game just over a minute later to put Carolina ahead 3-2 after Drayson Bowman found him open in the neutral zone.

From there, Semin carried it into the Columbus zone and teed up a shot at the top of the right circle that handcuffed McElhinney, beating him high over his trapper.

Bowman later caused a turnover in the Columbus zone that allowed Kevin Westgarth to push the puck to Jay Harrison who then dumped it towards the net where Staal got a hold of it and tucked into the net to McElhinney’s left.

The Hurricanes’ three unanswered goals gave them a 4-2 lead and caused Columbus coach Todd Richards to make a change in net as Mike McKenna entered the game with 11:55 to play in the period.

After defenseman Mike Komisarek was penalized for holding, the Blue Jackets capitalized on the power play and scored as Ryan Johansen’s one-timer off a pass from Jenner made its way through a few bodies and trickled inside the post to Ward’s right.

With 32 seconds remaining in the period, the most bizarre call of the night was made when Semin was penalized for delay of the game for not wearing his equipment properly as a result of his jersey being tucked in the right side of his pants.

The league placed an emphasis on enforcing the equipment section of the rule book this season and the Russian forward ended up being the poster boy for it.

“We’re aware of it,” Muller said.

“Sems certainly wasn’t doing it on purpose. First time wearin’ the jerseys, they just kept poppin’ up. They said they were gonna’ be strict on it and we’re aware of it. We’ve just gotta’ find a way of preventing it from happening to guys.”

Leading 4-3 to start the third period, Carolina still had to kill off the remainder of Semin’s ‘tucking’ penalty which they did successfully.

However, in the transition to even strength, Gaborik found space just inside the post to Ward’s left to score on a shot he took from the low slot to tie the score 4-4, just six seconds after Semin got out of the penalty box.

Columbus continued to build on the momentum generated from Gaborik’s goal, and followed it up soon after with the eventual game winner as Sean Collins put the Blue Jackets ahead 5-4 with 13:34 to play.

It wasn’t until just over nine minutes later with 4:02 left in the period, when Gaborik was called for tripping Jeff Skinner, that the Hurricanes had their best chance to tie the game.

However, two different sets of power play groups couldn’t capitalize on the opportunity.

Once both teams were back at even strength, Carolina pulled Ward from the net for one last man-advantage opportunity, but were still unable to even the score and ended up losing their first preseason test of the year.

“We wanna’ be a team that’s on the puck in pursuit and that demands skating,” Muller said.

“I thought some guys were skating alright tonight and I thought some guys weren’t. To play a system where you’re going up and down – pushin’ five guys down, five guys back – we weren’t just quite there.”