The Carolina Hurricanes’ first playoff game in a decade resulted in a two goal loss to the defending champions, the Washington Capitals, that featured a pair of first period power-play goals from the Caps.
The easy solution is to stay out of the penalty box and avoid giving talented players the chance on the man advantage. But penalties happen and it’s hard to win a game, let alone a playoff series, if the opposition is clicking at 50% with the man advantage. The penalty kill simply has to be better. So what went wrong?