Eric Staal broke out of his goal scoring drought in a big way yesterday with a natural hat trick, scoring the Canes second, third and fourth goals of the game against the lowly St. Louis Blues. His third goal came with only 8 seconds remaining in the game, as the Hurricanes tried to get him the puck (and the hat trick) in the final minute of play.
One might call it poetic justice, because yesterday happened to be John Deere hat giveaway night. They gave out 18,000 hats to the fans entering the arena, and let's just say that a lot of those fans didn't leave with hats.
I'm certain that the staff was ready for it. When you give out that many hats, and you've got a guy with 2 goals and a good chunk of time left in the game, you've got to be prepared. They must've had the trash bags ready because they were out on the ice picking up hats as soon as it started "raining green" - as Chuck Kaiton put it on his radio broadcast.
Honestly, Carolina didn't play that great at any point in the game, and the Blues got a lot more scoring opportunities than I think they should have. Cam Ward did a great job making saves most of the night and I was surprised he didn't end up as the second star of the game.
Speaking of stars, Eric Staal was named the league's #1 star yesterday with his hat trick in the NHL.com Three Star Contest. He's in second place overall to Jaromir Jagr. It's totally meaningless, really, but the three star contest does indicate when you are one of the top 3 players in the game that day - at least according to some subjective criteria! Go Eric!
Carolina plays a big road game against the first place Philadelphia Flyers on Tuesday. A win will guarantee we'll remain in first place by ourselves for another night. A loss will put Philadelphia on top.
GO CANES!
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