- Rod Brind’Amour didn’t hold back after the Hurricanes fell 5-2 to the Capitals
- The defending champs are 0-1-1 and have scored twice in two games
- Read below for video of Brind’Amour’s full postgame press conference
Rod Brind’Amour is already running out of patience.
The Hurricanes coach was asked after Friday’s 5-2 loss to the Capitals whether the team could use some new blood from its AHL affiliate in Chicago. He called that a management decision, then made it clear where things are headed if the play doesn’t change.
“I mean, that’s the management decision,” Brind’Amour said. “Obviously if we keep going like this, we’re going to have to do something.”
He added that the group already in the room is capable of a lot better. Two games into the title defense, Carolina is 0-1-1 and has scored twice.
Watch Brind’Amour’s full postgame press conference:
Earlier in the presser, he was asked if there were any positives to pull out of the night.
“There’s not a lot of positives out of that game,” Brind’Amour said. “The start was not good. You get behind the eight ball with kind of a freebie. You can’t give good teams free goals, and I thought we gave two of those up tonight.”
Without naming names, he also pointed at a few players who need to be better.
“I just think we got a couple of guys that need to get their game up,” he said. “When we’ve got 20 guys rolling, we’re a good team. When we don’t, it’s too hard.”
Washington scored three times in the first 14:23. Alex Tuch had two of them in his Capitals debut, the first coming after Pierre-Luc Dubois stripped Brandon Bussi behind the Carolina net.
Asked about his message to Bussi, Brind’Amour put it on the skaters in front of him.
“We got to be able to bail him out,” he said. “Obviously there was a couple you’d like to have back, but I don’t even know that would have mattered tonight. We got to come out with a little more urgency.”
Offense has been the bigger issue. Carolina dropped its opener 1-0 when Gustav Forsling won it for Florida in overtime, and Sebastian Aho didn’t get the Canes on the board until a second-period power play Friday.
It took nearly five full periods for that first goal of the season to come, and Ryan Leonard answered for Washington eight seconds later:
Captain Jordan Staal was asked for his own assessment, and he didn’t sugarcoat it either.
“We got outplayed and outmatched in our home building,” Staal said. “We’ve got to step up, to a man.”
Logan Stankoven added a third-period tip for Carolina, but that was as close as it got. Brind’Amour also shuffled his lines in the second period and said afterward he “was just trying something” to shake it up.
Catch the highlights from Friday’s loss:
Carolina doesn’t get long to regroup. The Hurricanes wrap up a back-to-back Saturday night in Philadelphia against the Flyers.
