Hurricanes at Ducks: Game Preview 3-2-14

Carolina Hurricanes at Anaheim Ducks
March 2, 2014 - 8:00 pm ET
Honda Center - Anaheim CA
TV - Fox Sports Carolinas
Radio - 99.9 The Fan

SB Nation Rival Blog: Anaheim Calling

Hurricanes Record: 26-25-9 | 61 pts | 7th Metro | 13th EC
Ducks Record: 42-14-5 | 89 pts | 1st Pacific | 1st WC

Post-Season Picture:

Games Remaining: 22
Minimum Points Needed: 92
Points Back: 31 (1.41 points/game)
Playoff Chances (Sports Club Stats): 5.6%
Fantasyland photo courtesy of © Tom Simpson, flickr

The Canes and Ducks will square off for the second and final time this season. The Canes defeated the Ducks in Raleigh on November 15th in a rare shootout win.

What to know about the Ducks:

• They have the best record in the NHL.
• They lead the league in even strength play and are top five in most other categories (special teams being the one exception where the rank in the middle of the league).
• They have two players (Ryan Getzlaf and Corey Perry) in the NHL's top ten for points and goals.
• They are playing in only their second game since the Olympic break. In their other game (Friday night), they defeated the St. Louis Blues 1-0 for Jonas Hiller's fifth shutout of the season.
• At today's game they will be honoring seven Olympians who brought home five medals from Sochi.
• They have Teemu Selanne, who is kind of great.
• They should have a healthy lineup with the exception of Mathieu Perreault, who left Friday's game with an upper body injury and is questionable for today.

What to know about the Canes:

• The Canes played a man's game but couldn't stay out of the penalty box and couldn't capitalize on their chances and came out on the wrong end of a 3-1 decision against the Kings for their fourth straight loss.
• Since the Olympic break, in three games they have scored four goals, been short-handed 16 times, and are -2 for 13 on the power play.
• They now have a 5.6% chance of making the playoffs with over a quarter of the season left to play.
• Andrej Sekera has points in all three games since the break after logging a career-best 10th goal in yesterday's loss.
• The Canes are on the schedule to practice at 2:30 pm ET, and practice may be limited, so we won't know until later today who will be in net, or whether there are any changes to yesterday's lines or whether Alexander Semin (lower body) will have his stick stolen again by Corey Perry.
• In yesterday's post game coverage it was mentioned that Jim Rutherford and Ron Francis will remain with the team through today's game, then fly back to Raleigh to begin deliberating on roster decisions.

We'll have the game thread open and ready to roll by 7:30 pm.