Carolina Hurricanes Training Camp: The Powerplay

Since the beginning of time, the Hurricanes’ powerplay has been the scourge of fans and media alike. Despite the the team being generally terrible at even strength, on the penalty kill, in overtime, in shootouts and in ticket revenue (oh snap), ire seems to disproportionately drift towards the man advantage. It’s understandable to see why: the ‘Canes have finished above the league average in terms of goals-per-game in seven out of the last eight years, yet higher than 17th in powerplay percentage only once (’07-’08). More often than not, the powerplay has finished in the bottom ten.

Elite Powerplay Quarterback Tim Brent

A few key aspects of the makeup of the Hurricanes may help explain the disparity between even strength and powerplay scoring. While in many seasons the team has had its fair share of puckmoving defensemen, they have lacked a true PP quarterback, instead entrusting key powerplay minutes to players such as Joe Corvo and Joni Pitkänen, who possess a wealth of talent but little hockey sense and thus more appropriately belong on a second unit. In other seasons the team has had next to no skill on defense whatsoever, leaving them to resort to borderline NHLers such as Andrew Hutchinson, stonehands defensemen like Tim Gleason or Bret Hedican, and often four and sometimes five forwards on the PP, with the likes of Tim Brent and Jeff Hamilton running the point. At one point during the ’06-’07 season, having exhausted nearly every other available option, head coach Peter Laviolette completely gave up and iced a powerplay unit featuring Glen Wesley and Rod Brind’amour on the points (video evidence of this).

Moreover, the team has typically had at least a few significant forwards per season (Erik Cole, Tuomo Ruutu, Jordan Staal) who play a high-intensity physical game that is successful at even strength but doesn’t lend itself well to the powerplay where the game slows down. Others forwards (namely Jeff Skinner) have a difficult time utilizing their teammates effectively and aren’t able to use the manpower advantage to the team’s benefit. On the whole, the ‘Canes have been short on playmakers and “half-court” players who tend to excel on the powerplay.

The good news it that the #FancyStats would seem to indicate a turnaround on the horizon. Indeed, the Hurricanes were woefully unlucky on the powerplay last season, finishing 11th in the league in terms of shots-for per 60 minutes during 5-on-4 powerplays, yet just 28th in goals-for. During the previous five seasons the ‘Canes more or less got what they deserved, finishing (on average) 19th in the league in shots-for/60 and 16th in goals-for.

Among the unfortunate shooters during ’12-’13 was Eric Staal, who scored just 2 goals on 31 5-on-4 shots (6.5%) after scoring 50 goals on 260 shots (19.2%) the previous five years. Justin Faulk scored 0 goals on 25 shots after scoring 5 goals on 27 shots in his only other NHL season. And while Jordan Staal isn’t a great PP performer by any means, his 5.9 shooting % was less than half (13.5%) of his shooting percentage over the five seasons preceding. On the whole, the Hurricanes managed to shoot at 9.94%, good for 30th in the league. This is simply unsustainable over a long enough period of time, though the team’s tendency to lose a key player to injury prior to the start of nearly every season may indicate that they are cursed, likely due to Justin Williams viciously carving up Saku Koviu’s eye, which Habs fans are still complaining about because their 7th-seeded team with Cristobal Huet in net was destined for the Cup or something.

The bad news is that the Hurricanes will be without nearly everyone who spent significant time on the point: Corvo, Pitkänen, Brent, Jamie McBain, and Marc-Andre Bergeron. Only Faulk and Alex Semin return. Although the departures are by no means the cream of the crop in terms of PP ability (and every notable forward will be returning), many of the players brought in to replace them instill even less confidence. Let’s take a look at the new defensemen:

Ryan Murph–wait, is that CHAD???

RYAN MURPHY. Murphy brings roughly ten times more raw offensive talent than every other Hurricanes’ defenseman combined, but nevertheless there are some questions about his ability to run a powerplay. Last year, Murphy recorded 19 powerplay points in 54 games with the Kitchener Rangers. The OHL-to-NHL equivalency is .30, which means that he could theoretically be expected to score a whole 9 powerplay points over a full 82-game NHL season. However, his numbers were much better in previous years, posting 26 PP points in 49 games in ’11-’12 and 47 PP points in 63 games in ’10-’11. Murphy’s development may be better served playing big minutes for the Charlotte Checkers, but an immediate need for the parent club may result in him skating #7 D minutes with first unit powerplay time.

ANDREJ SEKERA. Sekera has registered 16 powerplay points in his career, with just 1 point over the past two seasons. The last time he got a significant opportunity with the man advantage was 10-11 and the results weren’t great, with the Sabres averaging 4.20 goals for per 60 minutes of 5-on-4 time. It’s worth noting that his most frequent teammates on the powerplay were Tyler Ennis, Jochen Hecht and Jordan Leopold, so it’s possible that being on a unit with better players could produce better results. Or not.

RON HAINSEY. Hainsey has been all but removed from the powerplay for the better part of four seasons, but before that had been a decent, Corvo-level option, scoring 23, 23, and 18 PP points during a three-year stretch. Still, it has been nearly five years – an eternity in hockey time – since Hainsey was utilized on the powerplay. Does he still have that ability, or has he not seen much powerplay time for a reason?

MIKE KOMISAREK. Mike has never scored a powerplay point ever.

Up front, Elias Lindholm will likely get a chance on the powerplay if he makes the team, which he will because the competition is kind of sad and the Hurricanes pretty much don’t care at all about developing players. Lindholm offers what no other scoring forward other than Semin does in the form of a right-handed shot. Capable of playing both the half-boards and in front of the net, Lindholm recorded 13 powerplay points (including 8 goals) in 48 games as a 17-year old playing against men in the Swedish Hockey League last year.

POWERPLAY UNIT PROJECTIONS:

PP1:
Jiří Tlustý – Eric Staal – Jeff Skinner
Alex Semin – Ryan Murphy

PP2:
Jordan Staal – Elias Lindholm – Tuomo Ruutu
Andrej Sekera/Ron Hainsey – Justin Faulk