Highway Song

The Canes are back on the highway for 3 games and will spend the holiday on the road. Tonight they'll play their first game of the three in Madison Square Garden before they face the Islandgirls tomorrow night. The Rangers and ex-Canes will be looking for some payback after being handed a tough loss last week at the RBC. We will probably see Lundqvist in goal instead of Kevin Weekes who was between the pipes last time against us. Cam Ward will probably be in net tonight although we could see John Grahame as they figure to split the duties over the next 2 games. Tim Gleason and Nic Wallin were both back in the lineup against the Stars while Tanabe and Hutchinson were healthy scratched. One of them may be back in the lineup tonight as Laviolette likes to play 7 defensemen, but which forward does he scratch? LaRose has been playing lights out and has been a force on the PK. Ladd has been doing all right. Maybe since the forwards are all playing well, he'll stick with tradition and go with 12 forwards and 6 defensemen. We'll have to wait and see tonight!

Rod Brind'Amour leads the Canes and is 2nd from the top of the entire league in scoring with 31 points. Ray Whitney is right behind with 28. Jaromir Jagr leads the Rangers and is at the top of the league with 32 points, so we have a couple of the league leaders under the same roof tonight. Brendan Shanahan is tied for the league lead with 16 goals.

Obviously trade talk has sizzled down now that the team is on a winning streak and quite frankly there is no need to make a trade at this time as long as we keep winning. That doesn't rule out an attempt at an upgrade before the trade deadline though. You never know what Jim Rutherford has up his sleeves. We do have some room with the salary cap which gives us flexibility that some other teams, (Sabres, Lightning, Devils) don't have.

The game will be on Versus tonight at 7. Let's Go Hurricanes!

Blackfoot