By AIDAN JENSEN
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The Carolina Hurricanes played arguably their best game of the Eastern Conference Finals in Game 4 against the Florida Panthers, battling to – literally – the final whistle in a 4-3 loss that ended their season.
Canes winger Jesper Fast tied the game with approximately three minutes to go, barely pushing a one-timer past Panthers goalie Sergei Bobrovsky and sending Carolina’s bench into celebration – and relief.
Yet Florida’s Matthew Tkachuk, who arrived as a major free agent last offseason, scored his third game-winner of the series – this time with four seconds left. His teammates skated over and jumped on him at the boards in celebration, FLA Live Arena erupted in joy and threw toy rats on the ice, signaling the Panthers were going back to their first Stanley Cup Final in 27 years.
The series was defined by a couple things: Sergei Bobrovsky is the best postseason goaltender in the NHL, Florida can pick literally anyone on their roster to score a goal and the Canes largely showed an inability to create offense – once again, turning back to a solid Bobrovsky.
One thing the sports world realizes is the best teams having a designated “closer” – one player that, if everything else isn’t working, can send a team home with a win.
Tkachuk proved that in the ECF, scoring three game-winners.
The closest thing Carolina had to a “closer” this postseason was Jesper Fast, who tied Game 4 late in the ECF and ended the previous round with an Game 5 overtime winner of his own.
There are plenty more players on the Canes who have the ability to close out games, but weren’t able to crack Bobrovsky.
Take their top player, Sebastian Aho. He scored five goals this postseason, but completely disappeared against the Panthers with no goals. Martin Neças failed to score in the ECF, yet had four goals previously in the postseason. Seth Jarvis scored his fifth goal of the playoffs in Game 1 against Florida, but didn’t score again. Brent Burns, Carolina’s trade deadline acquisition, was a non-factor pretty much the whole series.
Does Carolina need to get a Tkachuk-like player so that next postseason, they can close out games? Do they need a goaltender like Bobrovsky, who can literally win them games by himself?
Giving the Hurricanes the benefit of the doubt, Max Pacioretty and Ondrej Kase (two more acquisitions) were out the whole series. The Canes, however, had plenty more players who could’ve delivered.
Regardless of what roster areas Carolina decides to address this off-season, one thing is clear: they need a proven closer.
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