Season Review: Carolina Hurricanes

Well, now that people are talking playoffs, I will be reviewing the seasons of teams as they're either eliminated from the playoffs or eliminated from playoff contention before the end of the season. Obviously, the last team reviewed will be the one that wins the Cup.

Now the seventh team to be eliminated from playoff contention: The Carolina Hurricanes.

Season expectations: These guys were one of the "Cinderella stories" of last season. A rough-and-tumble team in the same division as the almighty Washington Capitals battled their way to the Eastern Conference Finals where they were eliminated by the eventual Stanley Cup champion Pittsburgh Penguins. Not much was figuring to change greatly during the off-season so these guys looked like they were going to have a nice foundation to build off of.

My prediction: The team would finish second in the division and sixth in the Eastern Conference.

The truth: The team was eliminated from playoff contention yesterday following a 4-0 shutout loss to the New Jersey Devils.

What went wrong?: You mean aside from an injury to Cam Ward that damn near killed him?

Well, there's a lot of money being invested in the scoring forwards and the team isn't getting the results it should be. Jussi Jokinen and Eric Staal have been bright spots for the team and Ray Whitney hasn't been half bad either. But neither Erik Cole or Sergei Samsonov have come close to justifying their contracts and considering that they'll be on roster for next season, that's kinda a problem if they can't get it together next year. Rod Brind'Amour might be dried up offensively, but when you consider he's damn near 40 you can't necessarily fault him for it.

The defense on the team's pretty thin too. Even when you consider who they moved out before the trade deadline, there were a lot of players with semi-inflated salaries when they weren't producing at a level that would make their contracts worth it. Sure Tim Gleason and Joni Pitkanen were top-four defenders for sure but after that, it just kinda dropped off. That will need to be addressed in the off-season for sure.

In short, there were too many players with too many comfortable contracts who weren't having much to play for once they got their paydays. Hopefully that's realized the next time they're up for an extension.

So what's next?: GM Jim Rutherford has pledged that the team is in rebuild mode, which means that these guys might not necessarily be playoff contenders next season. Yet considering Rutherford's own inconsistency as a GM, will he eventually be axed in favor of someone who has a new vision for the team? Stay tuned.