GDT: Carolina @ Montréal: To Protect and Serve the Alpha Quadrant

[CanesAvs16]

Committing to failing is a pathetic mindset to have.

Makes me laugh every time I hear someone say how top notch the Pittsburgh management is for what they built. They didn't build anything. They sucked out loud for long enough they drafted Fleury, Crosby, and Malkin within 4 years, and have ridden those guys as long as they could have.

Agreed.

 

[dogbazinho]

I actually thought Semin played well. He disrupted alot of plays on the PK and even strength. On offense he probably held up the puck too much waiting for Staal to do something useful. Staal was 3 steps slow this entire game and it really hurt that line.

 

[dogbazinho]

Committing to failing is a pathetic mindset to have.

Makes me laugh every time I hear someone say how top notch the Pittsburgh management is for what they built. They didn't build anything. They sucked out loud for long enough they drafted Fleury, Crosby, and Malkin within 4 years, and have ridden those guys as long as they could have.

Yeah great comparison. What a terrible situation to be in.

 

[donkshow]

Semin needs to start shooting more, especially on the PP. Always trying to make the perfect pass.

 

[Identity404]

The Good: PK looked better. Lets keep giving Semin more time out there if he wants it.

The Bad: The entire team.

The Ugly: A tie between Cam letting in that third goal and Eric in the circle tonight. Seriously WTF?

 

[Lazyking]

Awful game all around really. Hope we get Skinner back soon.

 

[Finlandia WOAT]

'Canes fans to arms! The Semin is better than Parise thread has been bumped!!

 

[bleedgreen]

Scary how one injury makes the offense fairly impotent. Not sure we can be taken seriously with the third line as it is. Ruutu's injury threw us for a loop for sure.

If we are contending at the deadline, it will be interesting to see what direction we go in. Another dman and a legit forward for the third line seems likely.

 

[PaulProteus]

Verdict: Not even mad. Maybe I adjusted my expectations low enough not to be disappointed.

Our first regulation loss in 16 days with a roster stuffed with a couple days worth of emergency Charlotte call-ups? I'll live with it. Ward was pretty damn good all the way up until he **** the bed in the 3rd. Again: I guess I can live with it.

 

[CanesAvs16]

So will we see the same lineup on Thursday or will there be more shuffling with Charlotte? (Assuming nobody comes back from injury)

 

[CanesAvs16]

'Canes fans to arms! The Semin is better than Parise thread has been bumped!!

And damn they are really slamming Semin. Until this year I've never noticed how good of an all around player Semin is. Also, he seems to be happy here. I would choose Semin over Parise any day.

 

[dogbazinho]

And damn they are really slamming Semin. Until this year I've never noticed how good of an all around player Semin is. Also, he seems to be happy here. I would choose Semin over Parise any day.

In typical hfboards fashion I'll say I'd rather have Semin and a +5 million dollar player than Parise any day.

 

[DaleCooper]

This game:

 

[vwg*]

Honestly, even with all the injuries, we're just not a very good team. When most of our depth guys are at best 4th liners and bottom pairing d-men, we aren't going far... especially when this problem compounds itself with injuries to our top players. I know we're leading our **** division but I see minimal improvements over last team wise. Muller is a good coach but he's hand tied with a poorly constructed roster. Our top 6 is good enough to hang with anyone, but only when healthy. Other than them, we're an average to poor team. And Cam's lack of consistency will end up biting us again, although anyone has to admit he had little help tonight, at least offensively.

 

[Lazyking]

See, I feel when healthy, this team is a playoff team but we really miss Ruutu and the fact that we don't have many skill players that can just hold the puck on a string. We have to out work and grind almost every victory out. Muller knows this and has been trying to play towards that style.

Unfortunately, when our depth has to step up, especially with two new guys on short notice it's not going to be pretty.

 

[tarheelhockey]

Scary how one injury makes the offense fairly impotent.

Seems like a lot more than one injury to me.

Losing Pitkanen hurts this team badly. It's kind of weird how little it gets talked about, but there was a noticeable lack of flow in our offense tonight, and it had a lot to do with poor passing from the back end.

Losing Skinner cost us the dynamism of the second line, which basically means we're a one-line team.

As you said, we probably don't even know what we're missing with Ruutu. This team could be SO good on the forecheck with that extra bit of sandpaper.

Even losing Gleason hurts the offense a little, in the sense that it creates extra work for everyone else to cover for AHL'ers who can't handle what we're asking them to do defensively.

I'm pretty much writing off anything that happens until we get at least a couple of these guys back. Realistically a team cannot lose 4 players from the top half of the roster and not miss a step.

 

[Joe McGrath]

Canes go 8-2-1 over last 11, lose 1 game missing their #1 defenseman, #3 defenseman and their 2nd best offensive player to a team that's won 3 in a row, in their building and for some panic sets in. Get. A. Grip.

They were on a tear and they played a stinker. Big deal. If they come out looking like dog ****bagain maybe there's an issue, but this is one game. At least they're not the ****ing islanders.

 

[Novacane]

I'm not worried about this game at all. Just come out to play next game and we'll be fine.

 

[Joe McGrath]

I didn't notice Sanguinetti being terrible tonight, yet the poor guy still managed to be a -2 in 15 minutes of ice time.

 

[Wolfpuck]

NHL.com headline: "Budaj blanks Canes". Boy, if it weren't for him...

And Budaj is their 3rd star of the night

Do they even watch the games?

 

[WinterHawk]

And Budaj is their 3rd star of the night

The guy that created this GDT deserves the 3rd star more...

 

[bleedgreen]

Seems like a lot more than one injury to me.

Losing Pitkanen hurts this team badly. It's kind of weird how little it gets talked about, but there was a noticeable lack of flow in our offense tonight, and it had a lot to do with poor passing from the back end.

Losing Skinner cost us the dynamism of the second line, which basically means we're a one-line team.

As you said, we probably don't even know what we're missing with Ruutu. This team could be SO good on the forecheck with that extra bit of sandpaper.

Even losing Gleason hurts the offense a little, in the sense that it creates extra work for everyone else to cover for AHL'ers who can't handle what we're asking them to do defensively.

I'm pretty much writing off anything that happens until we get at least a couple of these guys back. Realistically a team cannot lose 4 players from the top half of the roster and not miss a step.

Losing two top 4 d, and without two top 6 forwards (counting ruutu) exposes the lack of depth we have, though you're right to say any team would have the same struggles to some extent. With the budget we work under I dont think there is any real fix. We have to be healthy to go far, but again that's every team. It's nice to be a legit playoff team at this point. Continued development and patience with the kids we have is the long term solution. Watching the red wings bring up guys like Anderson, Tatar, and nyquist reminded me of how a team does it right. Lot easier for them to be patient than us.

 

[PricePkPatch*]

Their breakouts have been just so much smoother than ours. Time and time again we lose the puck for a millisecond in their zone and then 3 seconds later they've already completed a nice breakout.

This has been one of our best feature this year so far; 3 defensive pairing with very skilled and defensively reliable PMD (Markov, Subban & Diaz). This, alongside an aggressive forecheck, are the main differences of our playstyle compared to last year.

Hard fought game, Canes. Up the 2nd goal, the game was tightly disputed. Hope to see you again with a healthy roster on both sides.

 

[Anton Babchuk]

Oh my god, the absolute WORST thing happened.

I checked my Facebook profile for the first time in awhile and I see that I accidentally "liked" Chad LaRose's player profile on Yahoo.

This is incredibly embarrassing for people to be under the mistaken impression that I "like" such a terrible hockey player.

This probably showed up in people's news feeds.

I am distraught and despondent.

 

[nobuddy]

Oh my god, the absolute WORST thing happened.

I checked my Facebook profile for the first time in awhile and I see that I accidentally "liked" Chad LaRose's player profile on Yahoo.

This is incredibly embarrassing for people to be under the mistaken impression that I "like" such a terrible hockey player.

This probably showed up in people's news feeds.

I am distraught and despondent.