Team Outlook: Carolina Hurricanes

Heading into the 2022-23 NHL season, I’m going to look at every team to see how they are looking going into the season.

(Jess Starr/The Hockey Writers) From: thehockeywriters.com

2021-22:

The Carolina Hurricanes went 54-20-8 and finished with 116 and first in the Metro. They would win round 1 against the Bruins in 7, but lost round 2 to the Rangers in 7. They were crazy at home during the playoffs, but not so much away.

Draft:

The Hurricanes didn’t have any 1st round picks, but they would have a 2nd rounder, where they would take Gleb Trikozov where he would finish 17th in Points Per Game in just his second season. Also, in this past summer, he would finish with 5 points in 5 games to help Russia win the Hlinka Gretzky Cup gold medal. They would also get Alexander Perevalov, another forward from the MHL. Also in his second MHL season, he put up over a point per game.

Additions:

The Hurricanes were pretty busy during the offseason. They traded Steven Lorentz (13 points in 67 games) and Eetu Mäkiniemi (0.922 SV% in AHL) and a pick for Brent Burns (54 points in 82 games as a defenseman) and Lane Pederson (18 points in 22 games in AHL). They also traded for Max Pacioretty (37 points in 39 games) and Dylan Coghlan (13 points in 59 games). They also signed Ondrej Kase (27 points in 50 games) and Ryan Dzingel (8 points in 32 games). This was one of the better off seasons I have reported so far.

Losses: However, with a lot of additions, comes a lot of subtractions. They lost Vincent Trocheck who had 51 points in 81 games and 10 points in the playoffs, defenseman Tony DeAngelo who had 51 points in 64 games, and Nino Niederreiter had 44 points in 77 games with the Canes last season. After trading for Max Domi at the Trade Deadline, he ended up leaving. Domi had 7 points in the 19 games he played with the Canes and had 6 points in the playoffs. Finally they lost Derek Stepan. The defenseman had 19 points in 58 games and no points in the playoffs.

Who to look for:

Goalie Pyotr Kochetkov played out of his mind in any league he played in last season. He was drafted in the 2nd round in 2019 and he has proved that the Canes have not made a bad choice. He went 10-10-2 with a .926 SV% in the KHL. Then he came over to America, not knowing any English, and posted a 13-1-2 record with a .921 SV% in the AHL. That got to be one of the best rookie showings I have ever seen. He was then called up after Anderson got hurt, and he went 3-0-0 with a .902 SV%. He would also post a .869 SV% in the NHL playoffs going 1-2, and .950 SV% going 5-1-0 in the AHL playoffs.

Jack Drury was drafted in 2018 by the Canes and had his first AHL season last season. He had 52 points in 68 games and got 2 goals in 2 games where he was called up by the Canes. He would also post 24 points in 18 games in the AHL Playoffs to help the Chicago Wolves get a Calder Cup.

Stefan Noesen was signed by the Hurricanes last season. He played 7 NHL seasons before but was sent down to the AHL for basically the whole season. In the AHL he posted 85 points in 70 games, and 25 points in 18 games in the playoffs. It was a season not seen before by Noesen, so I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s on the Canes NHL roster this season.

Prediction:

The Canes are pretty much the same, if not somewhat better. I’m really excited to see what this team can do to get back to the playoffs.

Stats from: eliteprospects.com, capfriendly.com, hockey-reference.com