Hurricanes announce 2021 regular-season schedule

The Hurricanes have known their opponents and length of schedule (56) games since the NHL officially announced its return to play over the weekend. Now, with the league releasing its full schedule today, they know the date and location for every one of those games.

Carolina will play the entirety of its regular-season slate against its new Central Division foes, the Detroit Red Wings, Nashville Predators, Florida Panthers, Columbus Blue Jackets, Tampa Bay Lightning, Dallas Stars and Chicago Blackhawks.

The Hurricanes will start this regular season where they ended before the pause, with a road game against the Detroit Red Wings on Thursday, Jan. 14. The team will open with four on the road, two games at Detroit and two at Nashville.

While the team won’t have fans in attendance to start the season, Carolina will open at home against Florida on Jan. 21. That will kick off a six-game homestand that will include two games apiece against Florida, Tampa Bay and Dallas.

It’s interesting to note when looking at the schedule, that, aside from a few standalone games, most of the schedule features sets of two games apiece against the same team in the same location, likely in order to minimize travel amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Hurricanes’ first seven “series” will be against the seven different teams in the division; they will have faced every opponent by Feb. 7.

The Hurricanes will spend almost the entire month of February on the road, with nine of 12 games coming away from PNC Arena. They’ll make up for that in the back half of their schedule, with 19 of the their 33 games from March through the first week of May coming at home. That could be to the Hurricanes’ benefit if conditions with the virus and distribution of vaccines through the first half of the season allows for limited fan attendance later on.

The Hurricanes will close out the regular season at Nashville on Saturday, May 8.

Here’s some other interesting notes from the schedule:

• The Hurricanes’ longest road trip of the season will be six games, which they’ll do twice, with games at Chicago, Columbus and Dallas from Feb. 2-13 and Tampa Bay, Florida and Dallas from April 19-27.
• The Hurricanes’ longest homestand will come in early April, with eight consecutive games against the Stars, Panthers, Red Wings and Predators at PNC Arena.
• The only true “home and home” that will involve more than two straight games against the same team is a stretch of four straight games against the Blue Jackets in eight days March 14-20.
• There is not a single Wednesday game on this schedule. Every other day of the week is represented.

The full schedule can be seen below: