Hurricanes coach Rod Brind’Amour runs perhaps the NHL’s most distinctive system, something Blackhawks coach Jeff Blashill has “talked to him a lot about” in the past.
Thursday proved how effective that system can be, regardless of personnel. The Hurricanes, having already clinched the Metropolitan Division title, rested seven key players — including their three leading scorers — and still annihilated the Hawks 7-2.
“One of the reasons that they’re a really good team year after year is their work ethic and compete on the puck is excellent,” Blashill said. “Although they obviously had a light lineup tonight, they still worked and competed on the pucks, and we didn’t do that enough.”
The Hawks could learn several things from that mentality. They also need to learn how to compete against it.
Too many times, Hawks forwards — especially Connor Bedard’s line with Nick Lardis and Teuvo Teravainen — assumed their defensemen could execute a breakout and started cheating early for offense. That’s an assumption that can’t be safely made against the Hurricanes’ relentless forecheck.
The Stankoven line consistently gets the job done 🔥 pic.twitter.com/AUMVQ20VoV
— y - Carolina Hurricanes (@Canes) April 10, 2026
Granted, the Hawks did win at Carolina in January — one of their most impressive victories of the season. But a blowout loss against a lineup one-third composed of AHL call-ups is alarming.
“It’s a hard system to play against, but we didn’t give ourselves a chance, really,” Louis Crevier said.
Blashill’s comment Wednesday about showing Hawks fans “how good we can be and how good we will be” during this final homestand is already aging poorly.
“We’ve done a pretty good job all year of competing pretty hard,” Blashill said Thursday. “I don’t want to overreact to a bad night. It’s frustrating, for sure. Our fans deserve better, for sure. I recognize all of that. But there are [bad] nights that happen, and this was one of them.”
Frondell shines
Anton Fronde
