Carolina waited for Ottawa to come home, and then knocked them from the ranks of the undefeated with a 5-3 victory.
Chad LaRose found himself playing on the third line, and took advantage. Although he didn't score any goals, his gritty play directly led to goals by Matt Cullen, Rod Brind'Amour, and Erik Cole. LaRose ended the night with 3 assists and got the #1 star.
Speaking of Erik Cole, I mentioned the other day how I thought he'd been playing well but just couldn't buy a goal - well, he got two of them tonight and they were beauties. One of them was basically on an empty net because Martin Gerber had just made a huge save on Eric Staal who almost knocked it in from the left side. Gerber slide across to make the save and slide right out of the crease while the puck rebounded to open ice on the right side. Cole skated up and knocked it in the net, going past a defender who looked like he was going to the ice for the block but didn't make it in time. By the time Gerber got to his feet after the save on Staal, the puck was bouncing out of the net.
The game itself was beautiful. Just an incredible amount of speed and skating. Lots of back-and-forth action, We led Ottawa 4-1 late in the third period but it wasn't a "dominating" performance, in fact I thought that Ottawa might've been playing a little better they were just being stymied by Cam Ward. They made it interesting with late goals at 16:16 and 18:11, but Eric Staal sealed the deal with an empty netter at 19:01.
Staal now has 8 points (5/3) while Cole has 4 points (1/3). 12 points through 5 games. Looking good so far for my prediction of 180 points between the two. Keep it up, guys!
The Canadian Tour continues Saturday night when the Canes take on Montreal.
GO CANES!
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