The Carolina Hurricanes are back in a conference final. Is it ‘win now or never’?
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- Carolina Hurricanes went 53-22-7 in the 2025-26 regular season.
- The Canes swept Round 1 and Round 2 in the 2026 playoffs.
- Carolina enters the conference final healthy, rested and seeking the Final.
That the Carolina Hurricanes went 53-22-7 in the NHL’s 2025-26 regular season is of little consequence now, right?
Well …
“The season is so long, and there’s that 82-game season we talk about that no one really gives much credit to, and yet this team has played well for eight months,” Canes head coach Rod Brind’Amour said last week. “It didn’t just get hot at the end. It’s been night in and night out like this.”
How about eight wins against zero losses in the 2026 Stanley Cup Playoffs’ first two rounds?
“That’s the impressive part, how we’ve gone about it,” Brind’Amour said. “Obviously we’re getting some huge performances, but everybody’s doing it. That’s how we have to get it done.”
So those records matter, to a point. Both are impressive — the regular-season mark is the Hurricanes’ second-best, and the back-to-back sweeps are an NHL first since the playoff format change in 1987.
But …
“We’ve got to do all eight wins again, just to get to the end,” defender Jaccob Slavin said. “It’s just another step.”
So what about “1-16”? Does that record matter?
(For those wondering, “1-16” is the Hurricanes’ record in their four previous Eastern Conference Final trips.)
That futility — and there is no other word for it, really — will only matter in the way those addressing it choose to perceive it.
But of course it matters, the same as the other records do. That is to say, it matters greatly in the macro — in the season and franchise narratives; but very little in the micro — neither in the immediacy nor the immediate future.
Breaking down the Canes ECF history
Let’s begin with the broader narrative, because that’s where the national discourse always seems to start.
The Hurricanes’ eight consecutive trips to the NHL playoffs is the second-longest active streak in the NHL. Carolina’s eight consecutive seasons with a first-round series win is by far the longest streak in the league right now, third all time, and best ever under the current playoff format.
Four trips to the Eastern Conference Final in those eight years, including this year, is nothing to sneeze at either.
However (and it’s a big “however”…) many pundits and detractors are quick to point out that the Canes are 1-12 in those games, and 1-16 overall in the conference final round since hoisting the Stanley Cup in 2006.
In 2009, the Pittsburgh Penguins, with a young, spry Sid the Kid, ran over the remaining shell of that 2006 team on their way to a Stanley Cup title.
In 2019, a plucky, upstart “Bunch of Jerks” weaseled their way into the conference final against Boston, which promptly dismantled a Canes team admittedly punching above its weight class in its return to postseason play.
In 2023, the Canes were swept by the Florida Panthers in a series that wasn’t a sweep, according to Brind’Amour. He took some heat for that comment, which was only meant to articulate that the Canes lost four one-goal games.
In 2025, Carolina finally won a playoff game against Florida after going down three games to none, and did so with a shutout. The Canes also went ahead 2-0 in Game 5, only to lose.
Again.
As it relates to this year’s group, the first four of those losses matter not at all. Seventeen years is a long time. One could also argue the 2019 setback matters nothing, either. Only five players — Sebastian Aho, Andrei Svechnikov, Jordan Martinook, Jaccob Slavin and Jordan Staal — on this year’s team were on the team that season, and only Staal had deep playoff experience.
The most recent nine games, though? Some memories are longer than others.
Hurricanes’ more recent track record
Perhaps the only games from that “1-16” mark that matter to this year’s team are the most recent five. That’s because 18 current Carolina Hurricanes were on last year’s team that lost, 4-1, to the Panthers. Eleven of those 18 were in Raleigh in 2023. That experience has added to the players’ hunger.
“We’ve got a good group in here who’s all been there before now, and everyone knows what to expect, and what is expected of us,” Slavin said, “so we have to make sure we go in with the right mindset and continue to chip away and work hard like we do.”
The Hurricanes’ work ethic under Brind’Amour has never been in question.
Early in his run, roster construction wasn’t perfect, with many players inherited from previous regimes and team owner Tom Dundon working his way toward his yearly spend-to-the-salary-cap philosophy — to his credit, a stark departure from the “lean years.”
One could also argue that even as the Hurricanes, first under Don Waddell and now Eric Tulsky, steadily built a roster to fit their style under Brind’Amour, the team’s overall health was never quite where it needed to be. Frederik Andersen stood on his head in 2023, posting a save percentage of .921 over three starts. But Svechnikov was out for the season by that point, hurting the team’s chemistry and depth up front. Teuvo Terravainen played just six playoff games.
In 2024, a lack of defensive depth bit the Canes in the second round against the Rangers, and in 2025, again against Florida, it was again a rash of playoff injuries that contributed to the team’s downfall, to go with inconsistent goaltending.
“They understand there is (another level to get to),” Brind’Amour said of this year’s team. “There’s going to need to be whenever we get to that next stage, or whoever we’re playing. One of the things about this group, they’re an honest group. They can assess their game, and their team game, and even though we won, they know we can get a little better.”
Why it’s now or (maybe) never
The 2025-26 season didn’t start out much better. Pyotr Kochetkov and Frederik Andersen dealt with early injury woes. Rookie-but-not-rookie Brandon Bussi emerged as the most stable option in net for most of the year.
Jaccob Slavin never really got on the ice at full strength until after the Olympic break. Early in the season, a rotating cacophony of defenders patrolled the blue line for the Canes — 10, in all, not counting Slavin.
But this time, the Canes acquired, and nurtured, depth to meet the moment. This time, a slump or two didn’t define the season. This time, the Hurricanes arrived at the start of the Stanley Cup Playoffs as healthy as they had since Brind’Amour’s tenure behind the bench had begun.
In Return of the Jedi, Emperor Palpatine toyed with Luke Skywalker in springing a trap on the rebel alliance, which thought it had surprised a weakened Death Star:
“Now witness the firepower of this fully armed and operational battle station.”
With apologies to George Lucas, teams in the Eastern Conference are seeing a fully armed and operational Carolina team.
In Round 1? A sweep, and plenty of time off to rest Andersen — and everyone else.
In Round 2? Another sweep. NHL history, and again, more rest. Most importantly, health.
And now? Healthy, rested and with the proper attitude, the Hurricanes are primed to do what they have not been able to do in 20 years: reach the Stanley Cup Final.
“We have to find a way to get that next step,” Brind’Amour said. “That’s obviously easier said than done. I know one thing is, they’re going to give that same effort, and that’s what we have to have.”
If not now, if not this season, when?
