Hurricanes owner won't panic

RALEIGH -- Sitting in the RBC Center, watching the Carolina Hurricanes practice Tuesday, team owner Peter Karmanos Jr. quickly offered up thoughts on a season quickly gone awry.

"This is a very good hockey team. I haven't given up on it," he said, his eyes rarely straying from the ice.

Moments later, "We have a great coaching staff."

A few minutes later, "I'm not worried. I'm not panicked."

But Karmanos, like many Hurricanes fans and everyone in the organization, is mystified about the team's stumbling 2-11-3 start and 12-game winless streak. The Canes, who face the Los Angeles Kings tonight, were the talk of the NHL late last season and in the Stanley Cup playoffs, beating the New Jersey Devils and Boston Bruins in a pair of rugged seven-game series to reach the Eastern Conference finals.

Most of the players are back. Some new players were added. Now, this.

"If I knew what it was, we could fix it," Karmanos said, shaking his head. "I think anything that could go wrong, has gone wrong."

The Hurricanes lost forward Erik Cole to a leg fracture for 10 games. Star center Eric Staal has been out the last three games with an upper-body injury and will miss more. On Saturday, the Canes lost goaltender Cam Ward for at least a month with a leg laceration.

Scoring goals -- or a lack thereof -- has been a season-long malady. And penalties. And a trend of allowing an opponent to quickly follow up one goal with another.

But Karmanos believes some of the team's current woes stem from the conference finals and a four-game sweep by the Pittsburgh Penguins, who then won the Stanley Cup. After a hot run down the stretch and the grinding playoff wins over the Devils and Bruins, the Hurricanes began finding ways to lose rather than a way to win, Karmanos said.

"Something happened," he said. "I don't think anybody could really figure out why we lost to Pittsburgh."

After the Canes lost the series opener to the Penguins, Karmanos said he told general manager Jim Rutherford that he thought the Hurricanes were the better team.

"The Boston team we beat was one heck of a good hockey team," he said. "New Jersey was really tough. So something happened. I don't know what it was, but it seems to have continued on through this season."

Karmanos noted he has never been around a team, at any hockey level, to go through a 12-game winless streak.

"I think once it breaks, we'll see the team that went to the conference finals and the final four last season," he said. "We just need to hang on tight, because we're just as capable of winning 12 in a row, or more capable of winning 12 in a row, as losing 12 in a row ... excuse me, a 12-game winless streak."

Could it be the Canes are a bit too old? Has age, and a lack of quickness, crept into their game?

"Absolutely not," Karmanos quickly replied. "Our key players are young.

"We're going to have to figure it out, but it's an interesting dynamic right now. We need support from the fans because I think the guys are working hard, I think they're talented."

When a team has fallen to 30th in the league and winless in 12 games, a coach probably would think the worst when the owner pops into town. But not Canes coach Paul Maurice.

"That's one of the huge advantage of having an owner that's grown up around hockey," Maurice said. "You don't have to explain the game to him. He has a great vision and a great view of the game. He knows what's going on the ice.

"He's always supportive when he likes what he sees and when he has a belief it's going to improve. I'm glad he does."

Karmanos said he was in town on business, not to hunker down with Maurice or offer words of support to the players.

His belief is that the team can begin to turn the season around, then once Staal and Ward return make another run.

Rutherford has been attending a meeting of the league's general managers this week in Toronto, but Karmanos said not to expect any trade or major transaction being conducted by the Hurricanes.

"We've got an excellent hockey team," he said. "Our defense is better than it was last year, I believe. We've got one of the best goaltenders in the league. Eric Staal is as good a young star as there is in the league, as far as I'm concerned. We've got balance on all our lines.

"It's not a matter of players. We just have to figure out what's going on. I don't know that it's a mental thing. I don't know what it is."

Note: Maurice said goaltender Manny Legace, signed Monday to a one-year contract, would start tonight against the Kings (10-6-2).

Latest Comment View all comments

Images