Are the demons of the past a concern for Carolina?
The Carolina Hurricanes got off to a stellar start in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference final against the Montreal Canadiens, hitting the back of the net in the opening minutes. Yet instead of setting the tone for the series, they quickly surrendered control, resulting in a disheartening 6-2 loss in front of their home fans in Raleigh, North Carolina.
While the franchise and many of its players are used to being at this point in the Stanley Cup playoffs from recent seasons, past eras might instill fear and doubt about their potential against a Canadiens team that hasn’t advanced to the third round since the 2021 COVID-impacted postseason.
On Friday’s episode of Daily Faceoff LIVE, co-hosts Tyler Tyler Yaremchuk and Carter Hutton broke down whether past demons may haunt the Hurricanes in the rest of the series against the Canadiens.
Tyler Yaremchuk: With Frederik Andersen, his best performance, and as we talked about yesterday, there are some conference finals demons when it comes to old Andersen. Is there any debate at all here? Because, again, we broke down these goals, he had no chance on the Cole Caufield goal; it was Ivan Demidov all alone. Juraj Slavkovsky’s goal, the fifth of the game, was a beauty as well. If you’re the Hurricanes, have you given any thought to sitting Andersen, or is he right back out there on Saturday night?
Carter Hutton: Not yet. Rod Brind’Amour said after the game that he considered it, but he also thought that it was good for him. He needs to get more action involved.
The one that really concerned me was the Slavkovsky one. He just looked like he wasn’t even in on the play, like I know Andrei Svechnikov comes flying over and Slavkovsky makes a great play on it, but he’s got to get up to speed, and he’s got to get to speed quickly, because right now there’s been no blips in the radar for Jakub Dobes, and again, to his credit, that early goal for most goalies might waver them, it might kind of make them crumble. For a 24-year-old kid, he just continually answers the call every single time he’s called upon.
There were a couple of good moments where he made key saves, kept them in it, and again, just like we saw in the Vegas Golden Knights game, a lot of blocked shots for the Montreal Canadiens, a desperate hockey team. It’ll be interesting to see which team bounces back in game two.
Tyler Yaremchuk: Brind’Amour, after the game, talked about Jacob Slavin, who we talked about again in that first goal, like, just kind of not being what we expect Jacob Slavin to be.
The last time Jacob Slavin was a -4 or worse in a hockey game was April 5, 2025. So, just over a year ago, he was -5 in a game against the Boston Bruins. It hasn’t happened often and I think that might be, again, like one of the only other times in his career he’s been that bad… I think you can kind of sit there and say, hey, we usually aren’t that undisciplined in our system, so we might have just needed a game to wake up some really reliable players to be at their best for us. Those are the reasons I’d be confident about a bounce-back on Saturday night. The only thing that does make me nervous is that — and I’m going to go right back to him — Andersen, on Saturday, but that makes me nervous. When it comes to Andersen, the demons of the past make me nervous. What makes me confident is that guys like Slavin aren’t going to be that bad again.
You can catch the full Game 1 breakdown and the rest of Friday’s episode here…