Justin Williams does it again as Hurricanes fight past Canucks in shootout
There was much for Carolina Hurricanes coach Rod Brind’Amour to like about Sunday’s game against the Vancouver Canucks.
The effort was there. The fight. A determination to make the plays necessary to win. An urgency.
That was missing for the most part Friday in a loss to the Vegas Golden Knights that Brind’Amour said was “terrible.” But the Canes would not be denied Sunday at PNC Arena, outlasting the Canucks 4-3 in a shootout.
“I thought we were pretty competitive throughout the whole game,” Brind’Amour said.
Sebastian Aho scored his 26th goal of the season and Andrei Svechnikov his 20th for the Canes, Svechnikov with a strong power move to the net in the third period that Brind’Amour called “special.” Nino Niederreiter, a healthy scratch in the Vegas game, also had a goal.
Teuvo Teravainen and Justin Williams -- yes, Williams again -- scored for the Canes in the shootout. Williams, after returning to the team from his sabbatical, had a shootout winner in his first game of the season, Jan. 19 against the New York Islanders. He beat goalie Thatcher Demko for another Sunday.
“Pretty clutch guy,” Brind’Amour said.
Canes goalie James Reimer allowed a leadoff shootout goal to Elias Pettersson, the dynamic Canucks forward who had scored twice in regulation. But he stopped J.T. Miller and then Bo Horvat to seal the victory after Williams delivered.
Having fallen out of playoff position in the Eastern Conference, and facing a four-game road trip that begins Tuesday against the St. Louis Blues, the Canes (30-19-3) needed the two points. To secure them, they had to beat a fast, skilled team that’s leading the Pacific Division and had a five-game winning streak, a team coming off a 4-3 overtime win over the Islanders on Saturday.
For a few scary moments, Brind’Amour and the Canes believed they might have lost another defenseman to injury. Brett Pesce left the game in the second period after being hit near the right hand by a shot, clutching his wrist as he quickly skated to the bench and leaving blood on the ice.
“The way it looked, obviously it looked terrible,” Brind’Amour said. “You’re fearing the worst.”
The Canes lost defenseman Dougie Hamilton to a broken fibula in the Jan. 16 game against Columbus. Hamilton, who had been selected for the 2020 NHL All-Star Game, might be sidelined for the remainder of the season.
But Pesce returned in the third period, having been stitched up.
“The boys kind of got fired up after that and we played harder,” Svechnikov said. “He’s a real warrior.”
Brind’Amour, after the game, said he wasn’t completely sure what happened to Pesce.
“It’s a slapshot that doesn’t hit any pad ... kind of blow up a vein and blood starts gushing everywhere,” he said. “We went in and saw him getting sewed up and then you just don’t know with the X-ray what’s going to happen there. Just real fortunate he was able to come back.”
Pettersson, swift and slick, was a game-long threat for the Canucks, scoring his 22nd and 23rd of the season, and had the shootout goal. Reimer did make a key stop on the Swedish forward with 2:40 left in regulation as Pettersson, the 2019 Calder Trophy winner, blistered a shot off the rush.
Demko twice stopped Teravainen in the overtime but Teravainen lifted a backhander past the Canucks goalie in the shootout -- Carolina is 4-0 in shootouts this season.
The Canucks (30-18-5) shut out the Canes 1-0 in Vancouver in December, Pettersson with the overtime winner. Goalie Jacob Markstrom had 43 saves in that game but had Sunday off after beating the Islanders on Saturday.
The Canucks were seventh in the NHL on the power play, but the Canes killed off all four penalties Sunday as Reimer had seven of his 32 stops.
“The standings are pretty tight, so we’ve got to try and get every point we can get,” Canes forward Warren Foegele said. “We got two there. Big road trip coming up and we’ll try to get on a run here.”
This story was originally published February 2, 2020 at 5:00 PM.
