RALEIGH, N.C. – The Carolina Hurricanes wanted to give their fans something good to be excited about just two days before Christmas, but a 4-3 loss to the Columbus Blue Jackets was what everyone at PNC Arena had to walk away with on Monday.
Two-point performances from Jeff Skinner (2g), Alex Semin (1g, 1a), and Jordan Staal (2a) were all overshadowed by two Columbus goals late in the third period that stole a win from Carolina’s grasp.
“It’s too tight of a league in games,” Hurricanes coach Kirk Muller said.
“You can’t make mistakes late in the game that are gonna’ cost you. We made two mistakes in the third; we were sittin’ there with a few minutes left in the game and they capitalized on two chances.”
A turnover and a line change created two opportunities for the Hurricanes’ new Metropolitan Division foe to not only tie the game 3-3 at the time, but to score the winning goal with 2:34 to play in the third period.
As new members of the NHL’s Eastern Conference, the Blue Jackets faced off against the Hurricanes for the first of five meetings that the two teams will have this season while battling for a playoff spot out of their division.
The two teams had only two points separating them in the standings and each was familiar in dealing with significant injury issues as Columbus came into the game with 150 man-games lost due to various ailments, not too far behind the Hurricanes’ 171.
Playing without reigning Vezina Trophy winner Sergei Bobrovsky in net and forward Marian Gaborik, the Blue Jackets knew what they would have to do against a recovering Hurricanes team that was playing better recently, but not earning their full potential of points in the standings.
The Blue Jackets saw an opportunity and their head coach was intent on finding and capitalizing on it.
“It’s no different, you have to find a way,” Columbus head coach Todd Richards said after the pregame skate when asked how he would direct his team to overcome the loss of key players while facing the Hurricanes in their rink.
“There’s no excuses. There’s a way to win the game tonight from both sides. We need to find the way on our side how to win the game, whether it’s managing the puck, playing harder than them, goin’ to the net harder. There’s a certain path that will allow you to win this game. We’ve just gotta’ find that path.”
It seemed that Richards’ words got through to his team as the Blue Jackets opened the game’s scoring on an Artem Anisimov goal in the slot that beat Hurricanes goaltender Justin Peters at 9:45 into the opening period.
As both teams skated from end-to-end during throughout the first period, along with Peters, who made 21 saves on the night, Columbus netminder Mike McKenna made his share of stops in a 30-save performance that forced the Hurricanes to reach deeper all game.
With 1:11 remaining, Skinner scored his 13th goal of the season on the power play and tied the game up 1-1 heading into the first intermission.
“We generated a lot, we had a lot of opportunities,” Skinner said.
“Just couldn’t hold onto the lead there.”
As both teams’ picked up the pace of play during the second period, penalties afforded power play opportunities to each of them.
Having given up goals due to poor penalty killing in recent losses to Washington (4-2) and Tampa Bay (3-2), the Hurricanes successfully kept Columbus off the score sheet in extra-man situations while they would finish 2-for-6 in converting on theirs.
After the Blue Jackets managed to retake the lead at 15:39 of the second period, Skinner answered back with his second power play goal of the game 46 seconds later on a cross-slot feed from Alexander Semin.
Heading into the third period tied 2-2 and with both goaltenders having made 17 saves apiece, neither team could afford to make any mistakes.
On an ensuing rush around the midpoint of the period, Nathan Gerbe chipped the puck towards the Columbus blue line where Jordan Staal picked it up.
As Staal broke in along the left boards and headed toward McKenna on a two-on-one with Semin, he had ample time to weigh his options.
Looking as though he would elect to shoot, Staal instead found Semin open and fed him a pass that the Russian forward one-timed past the Columbus goaltender to give the Hurricanes a 3-2 lead.
It was Semin’s fourth goal of the season – his first since an Oct. 24 game against Minnesota – and the reaction on his face showed his relief in netting the long-awaited marker.
With just over 10 minutes to play in the period, both teams’ physical play increased as each battled for valuable puck possessions and shots on goal.
Carolina was afforded one more power play after Blue Jackets defenseman Jack Skille was called for interfering and knocking down Manny Malholtra in front of the Columbus net at with 5:37 to play.
However, the Hurricanes were unable to tally one more special teams goal that would have effectively put the game out of reach in their favor.
Instead, Columbus took advantage of a Jir Tlusty turnover at its own blue line that allowed Mark Letestu to head-man a pass to Nick Foligno who broke then into the Carolina zone with a 2-on-1 with Ryan Johansen.
Foligno feathered a saucer pass over defenseman Tim Gleason’s stick to Ryan Johansen who beat Peters high to the glove side to tie the game 3-3 at 15:58.
Having been in the same situation before, Carolina was not in uncharted territory.
Giving up a lead in the third period and holding on to earn a point has been a script written and played out to many times in Raleigh so far this season.
However, another script that Hurricanes fans have become familiar with is the one that Columbus decided to play out to.
Reacting to a Carolina line change while the puck was in the neutral zone, the Blue Jackets found themselves with numbers along the Hurricanes blue line which they used to their full advantage.
A three-on-two eventually ended with another puck shot high to his glove side which Peters watched going into the back of the net as Skille scored the go-ahead and eventual game-winning goal for Columbus.
Unfortunately, for the 16,601 in attendance, the Hurricanes were unable to overcome the one-goal deficit they found themselves with in a matter of minutes.
They tried valiantly to tie the game and to at least earn a point like they have many times before.
However, it didn’t happen.
“Felt like we shot ourselves in the foot,” Hurricanes captain Eric Staal said.
“There were a couple of spots where you gotta’ make the right decisions and we didn’t and they capitalized on some odd-man breaks.”
After losing its second game in regulation out of the last three played, and only coming up with one point out of a possible six, Carolina found itself a step lower towards the bottom of the division standings.
When asked how he would refocus his team after the brief two-day break that the NHL will take for the holiday break, Muller said simply, “you take a deep breath.”
“That’s a real stunner right there,” he continued.
“You know it’s a huge game and you’ve got a break and you’re four, five minutes away from picking up two huge points. We beat ourselves there. We just gotta’ really swallow it right now and hurt for a few days. Terrible timing – we’re gonna’ have to come back charged up and pick up some of these points that we lost out on.”