Canes collapse in third period

RALEIGH -- Goaltender Manny Legace sat in the Carolina Hurricanes weight room at the RBC Center, head down, alone with his thoughts.

Some of the Hurricanes' players moved about a somber locker room with a barely controlled fury, angrily slamming gear into equipment bags for flight to Buffalo. Others seemed dazed.

In the course of a season, some losses are tougher to handle than others. But the Canes' 6-4 loss Friday to the Atlanta Thrashers, who erupted for five goals in the third period, may have been a crusher in a season that already has produced a bevy of defeats.

"I can't think of anything tougher than this one," forward Matt Cullen said. "To be up like we were in the third, and to give it up like that, is pretty tough to swallow."

The Hurricanes, coming off road losses at Dallas and Anaheim, led 4-1 after the second period and appeared on their way to a fourth straight win at home.

Erik Cole had a goal and assist. Cullen had a shorthanded goal. Stephane Yelle and Sergei Samsonov had scored goals, and Legace was making some hustling saves.

And then, suddenly, the collapse.

"I think we kind of thought we had it and already had the two points on the board," said Canes forward Tom Kostopoulos, who assisted on Cullen's goal that made it 4-1.

But the Thrashers, a speedy and dangerous offensive team, began scoring - and never quit. It would be Rich Peverley's goal at 13:57 that finally gave Atlanta the lead and was the game-winner, but that came after scores by Slava Kozlov, Ilya Kovalchuk and Maxim Afinogenov.

Kozlov and Kovalchuk, who bounced back from a first-period leg injury, scored 48 seconds apart. Again, the Canes had allowed two goals in less than a minute - a season-long malady - and Afinogenov tied the score at the nine-minute mark of the third.

"We definitely thought we had the game in control and weren't able to put it away," Cullen said. "Again, we gave them life when we didn't need to and couldn't afford to, and they jumped on it."

The Canes (5-15-5) played the third period without defenseman Joni Pitkanen, who left with an upper-body injury. But all the puck-handling problems in the Carolina zone can't be traced to the loss of one player.

"He's an important guy for moving the puck but, no, one defenseman can't be the difference," Canes coach Paul Maurice said. "Clearly, we struggled back there handling the puck. ... but we're not laying it at the feet of the 'D.' "

The Thrashers (12-7-3) trailed 2-0 early in the second after Yelle's goal and it could have been 3-0 or 4-0 had goalie Ondrej Pavelec not made some strong stops. Evander Kane scored for Atlanta, but the Canes answered with Cole feeding Samsonov for a score off the rush and then Cullen's goal - Carolina's second shorthanded score of the season.

"It looked like we had our offensive unit, you know," Maurice said. "Everybody back together again and looked like they were moving the way they needed to move.

"And maybe they felt that was a nice, comfortable game. They were getting lots of chances - working hard but getting lots of chances - and then decided that the back-half of the game wasn't too important to them in the third."

The Canes imploded under the all-out assault by the Thrashers, 8-2-1 on the road this season. There was turnover after turnover, mistake after mistake. The Hurricanes stopped skating, unraveled, with Marty Reasoner adding an empty-net goal for Atlanta at the end.

"It's kind of been the same story all year," Kostopoulos said. "It's all mental right now. It's a mental thing and we have to figure out how to get out of it, the spiral downward."

Speaking of spirals, the Hurricanes are 0-9-3 away from home and the only NHL team without a road victory. But they will have more on their hands tonight against the Sabres than just trying to win that first road game.

"Some losses you leave and forget," Maurice said. But this one we're going to have to deal with [today] and go through it.

"Because you can't just move on to the next game in our situation. You're going to have to deal with that."

Notes: Carolina had a goal disallowed in the first because Ruutu kicked the puck into the net.

Pavelec made 40 saves in his previous outing, a 2-0 victory in Detroit on Wednesday night.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

THRASHERS 6, HURRICANES 4

First Period--1, Carolina, Cole 3 (Gleason, Staal), 8:11. Penalties--Thorburn, Atl (cross-checking), 9:38; Slater, Atl (tripping), 18:37.

Second Period--2, Carolina, Yelle 2 (Brind'Amour, Gleason), 2:18. 3, Atlanta, Kane 8 (Enstrom, Armstrong), 10:31. 4, Carolina, Samsonov 3 (Cole), 13:45. 5, Carolina, Cullen 5 (Kostopoulos, A.Ward), 18:25 (sh). Penalties--Kane, Atl (slashing), 2:56; Brind'Amour, Car (hooking), 11:01; Pitkanen, Car (cross-checking), 16:31; Kozlov, Atl (tripping), 19:44.

Third Period--6, Atlanta, Kozlov 4 (Little, Salmela), 6:21. 7, Atlanta, Kovalchuk 14 (Enstrom, Afinogenov), 7:09. 8, Atlanta, Afinogenov 10 (Kovalchuk, Enstrom), 9:00. 9, Atlanta, Peverley 9 (Little, Bogosian), 13:57. 10, Atlanta, Reasoner 1 (White, Kubina), 18:57 (en). Penalties--Schubert, Atl (high-sticking), 3:01.

Shots on Goal--Atlanta 9-11-14--34. Carolina 15-12-9--36. Power-play opportunities--Atlanta 0 of 2; Carolina 0 of 5. Goalies--Atlanta, Pavelec 8-5-3 (36 shots-32 saves). Carolina, Legace 2-4-2 (33-28). Referees--Greg Kimmerly, Gord Dwyer. Linesmen--Steve Miller, Mark Pare.

Att.--14,463 (18,680). T--2:37.

Latest Comment View all comments

Images