The Carolina Hurricanes vented some frustration in a players-only meeting shortly after sustaining their fourth consecutive loss to begin a six-game road trip.
The Hurricanes hope the exchange of words in the locker room proves productive on the ice Tuesday night when they visit the Ottawa Senators.
“I’d obviously like to keep it in the room, but obviously we’re not happy and we’re frustrated,” Carolina forward Sebastian Aho said after his team’s 4-3 loss versus the Vancouver Canucks on Saturday.
“We’ve done a lot of talking. That’s not the first meeting that we had. The time is now to show it to us and to everyone what we are capable of, and the only way out is together.”
Martin Necas contends that the meeting had a positive vibe, despite the team’s recent negative results.
“Just got to get it together, stop being negative, even though it’s hard, and just support each other because we haven’t really gone through times like this before as this group and it’s tough,” Necas said. “But just got to build off little things and we all gotta be better and just help each other out because times like this are hard.”
While coach Rod Brind’Amour wasn’t pointing fingers, he did note the obvious.
“Our top guys are not scoring,” Brind’Amour said. “They’re not really contributing offensively, which is making it hard.”
Teuvo Teravainen, who leads the team with 11 goals, does not have a point thus far on the road trip. The same can be said for Aho (team co-leading 14 assists, club-best 22 points) and Seth Jarvis (19 points).
Defenseman Brady Skjei scored against the Canucks. He also found the back of the net and added an assist in Carolina’s 5-3 win over Ottawa on Oct. 11.
The Senators have answered their second three-game losing skid of the season by winning three of their last four contests.
“I think we’re consistent in what we’re doing right now,” said Claude Giroux, who collected a goal and an assist in Ottawa’s 5-1 victory Saturday over the Detroit Red Wings.
“They had a couple stretches where they were coming at us, but overall, we played a very consistent 60 minutes.”
Tim Stutzle scored a goal in that contest and also tallied in the first encounter versus Carolina. He leads the Senators in assists (20) and points (26).
Ottawa coach D.J. Smith was pleased with the balanced production from his lines in his team’s last game.
“We got a lot of jump from the Ridly Greig line,” Smith said. “There’s starting to be a bit of chemistry. It was good for (Dominik Kubalik) to score, but (Mathieu Joseph) and (Greig) were forechecking, they were above pucks and it really gave me that third line I could put out against anybody.”
The Senators hope that’s the case when they leave Canada’s capital. After Tuesday’s tilt, Ottawa plays three games in four days on the road, beginning with a meeting with the St. Louis Blues.
–Field Level Media
