How the Hurricanes turned the Stanley Cup playoffs from a hope to an expectation
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Canes now expect an eighth straight playoff berth as organizational standard.
- Five veterans anchor identity while Tulsky, trades and free agency add talent.
- Brind’Amour’s system and cap spending sustain runs; Cup requires steady play.
The Carolina Hurricanes are about to embark on a new hockey season, their goal being an eighth straight berth in the Stanley Cup playoffs, their eyes again on winning the Cup.
Eight straight. Let that sink in for a second or two.
Remember when the Hurricanes couldn’t make the postseason, going nine frustrating years without playoff hockey? And then they did, in 2019. Now they have for the past seven seasons. It’s an expectation.
Only five players remain from that 2018-19 team, the one forever known as the “Bunch of Jerks,” the one captained by Justin Williams, Rod Brind’Amour’s first team as head coach.
“Five?” forward Andrei Svechnikov said this week, then immediately reeled them off.
“Me, Slavo, Fishy, Staalsy, Marty.”
That would be Svechnikov, Jaccob Slavin, Sebastian Aho, Jordan Staal and Jordan Martinook. Call them the “Final Five.”
As Martinook put it, “We were here at the beginning, and I think Rod understands we’re the ones that show everybody how it’s going to get done.”
A new mindset
Svechnikov was a rookie that season, taken No. 2 overall in the 2018 NHL draft after the Hurricanes beat the odds and moved up nine spots in the draft lottery. Martinook had come to Carolina in a May 2018 trade with the then-Arizona Coyotes. “I played three years in Arizona where making the playoffs wasn’t even a thought,” Martinook said. “For us, it was, ‘I guess we can plan vacations in April.’”
Brind’Amour, ever intense as a player and the Canes team captain, would bring a new mindset to the team as the new head coach. “The way Roddy put it to us, this team should be able to make the playoffs every year,” Svechnikov said. “The way we play, the system we have, the way the coach asks us to play, that should make us a playoff team every year.”
And it has been in Svechnikov’s first seven NHL seasons, although the power forward did miss the 2023 playoffs after a knee injury in March.
“I don’t know anything but the playoffs, and I don’t want to know,” Svechnikov said.
The Canes have reached the Eastern Conference final three times in the seven years, losing to the Boston Bruins in 2019 and then twice to the Florida Panthers, in 2023 and again this past season.
‘I’d do anything’ to win the Stanley Cup
Everyone is chasing the Panthers as the 2025-26 season begins. Their back-to-back Cup championships have set them apart from the rest, although Panthers captain Aleksander Barkov and forward Matthew Tkachuk both will miss all or a chunk of this season because of injuries.
The Canes, again, made changes in the offseason in an effort to close the gap. Nikolaj Ehlers arguably was the most sought-after free agent when the versatile forward decided to leave the Winnipeg Jets, and the Hurricanes got him. A trade with the New York Rangers brought in defenseman K’Andre Miller.
The leadership group remains the same. Staal became the team captain in September 2019. Slavin, Martinook and Aho have served as alternate captains.
Staal won a Cup with the Pittsburgh Penguins in 2009, three years before his trade to Carolina The rest are after their first.
“If you asked me seven, 10 years ago how much you want to win in the Cup, I would say I’d do anything,” said Aho, who was drafted by the Canes in 2015. “And I would give you the same answer now.
“Being close, getting a little taste of what it would take and how awesome it would be to win, you keep dreaming it will happen some day. I think arguably I have more hunger for the Cup than I did 10 years ago.”
There was much hunger when the 2018-19 season began. Since the thrill of winning the Stanley Cup in 2006 — Brind’Amour the first to lift it that June night — the Canes had reached the playoffs just once, in 2009. They were becoming afterthoughts in the Triangle’s sports scene.
Things changed quickly when Tom Dundon, the Dallas billionaire, became majority owner in 2018. Dundon elevated Brind’Amour from assistant coach to head coach after Bill Peters was ushered out. Brind’Amour, in turn, soon would name Williams, a three-time Cup winner and former teammate, the new captain.
The Canes had been a “budget” team under former owner Peter Karmanos. Dundon, a first-time major league sports owner, quickly realized that to win, the team needed to spend to the NHL salary cap to secure the right players and expand their talent pool.
“Seems like every time you see a player available it’s, ‘The Canes are in on him, the Canes are in on him,’” Martinook said. “You want to play with the best players and want to be on the best team, and that’s something Tom’s not afraid to do.”
Added Svechnikov: “If you want to win, you’ve got to spend. Tom does that.”
Brind’Amour’s consistency
The Canes players say Brind’Amour, now 55, has changed little in the past seven years. He’s still in top shape, a fitness freak who at times has skated with the team in training camp drills. He’s direct and honest with his players.
“You are who you are, but as players you want to find that little one percent extra he talks about all the time,” Aho said. “I’m sure he tries to do that, too. I’m sure he learned a thing or two in his coaching.”
Brind’Amour’s system of play remains the same, with constant pressure in all three zones on the ice. It has proven to be a consistently winning system.
“We tweak things here and there,” Brind’Amour said. “We don’t want to have massive changes about things we feel good about.”
Looking back to the 2019 team, the Hurricanes secured the playoff berth after a 3-1 victory over the New Jersey Devils on April 4. Scoring for the Canes were Warren Foegele, Justin Faulk and Nino Niederreiter while goalie Petr Mrazek earned the victory.
When the Washington Capitals beat the Montreal Canadiens that night, the Canes were in. No April vacations. Let the partying begin. Get those tailgates ready.
“What a feeling, what a special moment,” Brind’Amour said that night. “It has been a drought. The goal was to get relevant.”
Hope turns to expectations
When the Canes line up Thursday against the Devils in the 2025-26 season opener at the Lenovo Center, only Staal, Aho, Slavin, Martinook and Svechnikov remain. The years have passed, the rosters have changed and there’s different management, but the Hurricanes remain relevant under general manager Eric Tulsky.
The draft has brought them forwards Seth Jarvis and Jackson Blake, both scorers and playmakers, and, finally, defenseman Alexander Nikishin in from Russia.
“They’ve done a good job of bringing in young guys and ones who can adjust quickly and make an impact right away,” Jarvis said. “That’s what you need to keep making the playoffs and making runs. Now, it’s a matter of us young guys taking that next step to get us over the hump.”
The expectation, not hope, is to be in the playoffs, for an eighth straight season.
“And not just make the playoffs, but be No. 1 in the league,” Svechnikov said.
ESPN has made the Canes co-favorites along with Edmonton and Colorado (+800) to win the Cup this season, to be No. 1. But there is a price to first be paid to be a part of the playoff chase, Brind’Amour said, and should not be forgotten.
“It’s seven months of good hockey, not two months of good hockey to win a Cup,” he said. “You have to be dialed in the whole time. You can’t have a rough stretch.
“That’s the challenge, for sure, to stay focused on being the best every day and not worrying about the big picture.”
Come Thursday, as a new season begins, that’s the big goal.
This story was originally published October 9, 2025 at 5:30 AM.
