Hurricane warning
Aho leads Carolina to win over Rangers in hockey’s return
TORONTO — Hockey’s back, and Hurricanes coach Rod Brind’Amour couldn’t be more impressed with how Carolina ushered in its return after 4
1⁄2months of waiting. Brady Skjei set the tone with a big hit on New York Rangers’ Jesper Fast in the opening minute. Jaccob Slavin scored on Carolina’s first shot on net.
And the game wasn’t three minutes old before Hurricanes forward Justin Williams fought Ryan Strome in Carolina’s 3-2 win in Game 1 of their best-of-five preliminary round series in Toronto on Saturday.
“The lead-up to it, there’s been so much of it, the guys were ready to play something for real,” Brind’Amour said. “Haven’t had that opportunity in a long, long time. Just wanted to take advantage of it.”
Slavin, who scored 61 seconds in, and Sebastian Aho scored a goal and assist each in the NHL’s opening playoff game.
Martin Necas sealed the win in a game the Hurricanes never trailed by onetiming a shot in off the skate of Rangers defenseman Marc Staal with 9:09 remaining.
The game was played without fans, and the NHL’s first ever played in August as the league attempts to complete a coronavirus pandemic-altered season and in a bid to award the Stanley Cup in late September or early October.
“Yeah, you noticed it when you were on the bench, no crowd, no noise,” Aho said. “But for me, at least, when I was on the ice, you didn’t pay attention to that. … It was intense, and it felt like a playoff game.”
The Metropolitan Division rivals kicked off the expanded 24-team playoff format, which will feature as many as six games a day being played in the hub cities of Toronto and Edmonton, Alberta.
Petr Mrazek stopped 24 shots, and the sixth-seeded Hurricanes defeated the 11th-seeded Rangers for just the seventh time in 38 meetings going back to the 2010-11 season. The Hurricanes had also lost five straight to New York, including being swept in their four-game regularseason series.
The Rangers proved to be a step behind in a game they managed just four shots on net in the opening period and 26 overall.
“For the first 30 minutes, we were slow,” Rangers coach David Quinn said. “They set the pace and the
tempo, and I thought it took too long for us to respond to it. … I thought we battled. It just wasn’t enough.”
The Hurricanes built a 2-0 lead on Aho’s tip-in goal before New York’s Mika Zibanejad deflected in Ryan Lindgren’s shot for a power-play goal with 5:34 left in the second period. Zibanejad then set up Staal’s short-handed goal, which cut the Hurricanes lead to 3-2 with 1:55 remaining.
“I feel like they outcompeted us, really,” Zibanejad said. “We didn’t really click. I didn’t think we were able to get on the same page.”
Henrik Lundqvist stopped 34 shots for New
York in starting for Igor Shesterkin, who was listed as unfit to play. For Lundqvist, it was just his sixth start since Jan. 2.
Quinn said he wasn’t sure whether Shesterkin would be ready for Game 2 on Monday.
Lundqvist had little chance on any of the goals, two of which were deflected in, and with Slavin opening the scoring while he was allowed to walk in alone down the left wing. Accepting Teuvo Teravainen’s pass, Slavin lifted a shot to beat Lundqvist on the short side.
Though the Hurricanes scored on their initial shot on goal, the pace of the game was slow and at times sloppy.