After an excellent year in 2008-2009 where the Carolina Hurricanes advanced to the Eastern Conference finals, the team regressed mainly due to injuries, inconsistent goaltending and depth issues.

Even though the Canes finished the season in 11th in the Southeast Conference, the team let in the fifth highest goal total in the league– after Toronto, Edmonton, Tampa Bay and the Islanders.  In short, something needed to change before the season started.

Rutherford knows what worked in the past and employing Joni Pitkanen for a league leading 27:22 of ice time simply did not.  Not a knock on Joni, but he may not even play top-pairing minutes come next season let alone more than Duncan Keith.

What worked in the previous season was all 6’5″ of Russian defenseman Anton Babchuk.  The Kiev native scored 16 goals as the trigger man on the powerplay during the 2008-2009 season before leaving the team for the KHL for the second time.  If he can match that production with his 1.4 million cap hit, the 26-year-old should be an excellent bargain.

Continuing with the same trend, Rutherford also brought back offensive defenseman Joe Corvo after dealing him a few months before.  This move adds stability to the blue line at a modest 2.5 cap hit while allowing young gun Jamie McBain to get a bit more NHL seasoning.  Paul Branecky of the Canes Official Website noted Corvo will be a lock to play with bruising defenseman Tim Gleason.

Safe to say they won that trade.

If the blue line did not looked stacked enough with Corvo-Gleason and Pitkanen-Babchuk manning the top four, the Canes traded for blue chip defenseman Bobby Sanguinetti.  If you watch the AHL, you will remember Sanguinetti as the fastest skater ever to skate in their skills competition.

Much like the deal to acquire Jiri Tlusty, the Canes went after a player who is young and has success at the professional level.  Both seasons that Sanguinetti played with the Hartford Wolfpack he made the All-Star team.  If not for the emergence of Michael Del Zotto, Matt Gilroy and now Ryan McDonagh, he would probably be wearing Ranger blue this coming season.

If Sanguinetti or AHL defender Bryan Rodney fail to make the roster, journeyman enforcer Jay Harrison will keep their spot warm.  In 38 games last season, Harrison stood up for teammates with 50 PIM and even chipped in seven points.  At 28-years-old he still has plenty of gas left which made him one of the first signings by the team this offseason.

Things should look up for the Canes defensive woes.  Part of the problem was the injury to Cam Ward and then the inconsistency of his predecessors.  With Ward fully healthy, the team should be ready for another strong season.

During the 2008-2009 season the team finished with the eighth fewest goals allowed, which seems to be more along the lines of the playoff team they are expected to be.  Of course time will tell with this new(ish) group but things certainly look up.

By the end of the first period, the outlook was bleak at best with the Hurricanes down 3-0.  Things started to turn around though in the second, Carolina began to mount a rally scoring two goals less than a minute apart.  Stephane Yell netted his first goal with the team and Matt Cullen quickly followed it up giving fans a spark of hope going into the third period.

Unfortunately that was somewhat short lived; when Alexei Ponikarovsky’s power play goal put the Leafs up 4-2.  At that point, Canes fans’ heads collectively dropped into their hands.  Enter Tim Gleason, who became one of the night’s many heroes.  Gleason had two huge goals in the third period; his second of the night coming on a power play to even it up at four goals a piece.

With more than seven minutes gone by and no other goals scored, this game seemed destined to need extra time.  Ian White had other plans in mind, though; he scored Toronto’s fifth goal to give them the lead with barely 30 seconds remaining in regulation.  Carolina pulled their goalie, Manny Legace, in the hopes that a man advantage could take this game to OT.  Finally, Erik Cole found the net to again tie the game, five all, with mere seconds left.  To overtime we go!

Last night was the fourth game in a row that a Hurricanes game has needed extra time to decide a winner.  After a scoreless OT, it was time for a shoot out.  Tuomo Ruutu and Jussi Jokinen both scored for Carolina; while Phil Kessel and Lee Stempniak were both denied by Legace.  So the Canes came out on top 6-5 in their third straight game decided by a shoot out.

Despite last night’s slow start; there is a lot of good I think we can take from the game.  The Hurricanes finally showed us they can come from being behind early to win a game.  I like seeing the team finish a game strong; hopefully that can carry over into Saturday night when Carolina faces the Tampa Bay Lightning at home.

Also, this afternoon Bryan Rodney was reassigned to the Albany River Rats (AHL) to make room for Joni Pitkanen’s potential return on Saturday night.