Five takeaways from the Carolina Hurricanes’ overtime loss to the San Jose Sharks
Five takeaways from the Carolina Hurricanes’ 2-1 overtime loss Monday to the San Jose Sharks, won on a goal by Alexander Barabanov at 1:42 of OT:
▪ Not every game is up and down and glorious scoring plays. Some are 60 minutes of grind and grit and putting body on body and blocking shots. And then deciding the game in overtime.
On Saturday in Los Angeles, the Canes (14-2-1) went into the third period with a 5-4 lead. Their lead Monday was 1-0 on Tony DeAngelo’s goal early in the second. But the Canes’ game was cleaner and more structured Monday. And both goalies were on their game.
One problem: the power play. The Canes were 0-2. “Our power play wasn’t very sharp. Didn’t get much zone time, didn’t get many shots,” DeAngelo said. Another problem was getting shots through at even strength — the Sharks (9-8-1) blocked 23 shots.
“It was a good game. We played well,” Canes coach Rod Brind’Amour said. “We couldn’t get pucks through but we were trying to do the right thing. I thought we had a solid game. Didn’t love our power play.”
▪ Watching a good goaltending duel Monday, it was like James Reimer vs the “new” James Reimer for the Canes. That would be Antti Raanta, who the Canes brought in to be the No. 2 guy for Frederik Andersen. Last season it was Petr Mrazek and Reimer. Now, it’s Andersen-Raanta.
Reimer was a pro’s pro in his two seasons with the Canes, a cheerful, good-attitude guy who had a quietly good 29-11-4 record. Raanta’s cheerful temperament is much like Reimer’s. Will the results be the same?
▪ It was a bit troubling to hear Brind’Amour talking about defenseman Ethan Bear testing positive for COVID-19 on Monday in San Jose. Brind’Amour was not sure how long Bear will be out, how many games he will miss or if anyone else might be affected.
“You look around the league and it’s very rare that one guy gets it,” Brind’Amour said. “It’s just an unfortunate thing everybody is dealing with. We’ll take it as it comes, I guess.”
▪ The Canes took a gamble on signing DeAngelo and certainly there was a backlash from some of their fans because of the defenseman’s background. Hockey-wise, the $1 million gamble is looking like a bargain after 17 games.
DeAngelo scored his fourth goal of the season, blasting a shot past three Sharks players and Reimer early in the second for the game’s first goal. He has 16 points and a plus-12 plus/minus rating that leads the Canes.
▪ Seth Jarvis played his 10th game for the Canes but his line had a different look Monday. Brind’Amour shifted Teuvo Teravainen onto Sebastian Aho’s line and moved Andrei Svechnikov to Jordan Staal’s line opposite Jesper Fast.
Brind’Amour might have been trying to jump-start Teravainen’s offensive game. After scoring goals in each of the first two games, the forward had one in the 14 games before Monday. Teravainen and Jarvis both earned assists on the DeAngelo goal in the second period. Jarvis did have his three-game goal streak come to an end.
This story was originally published November 23, 2021 at 1:43 AM.
