Rod Brind'Amour Says Hurricanes Can Chase 9 Straight Wins Against Canadiens – Hurricanes
The canadiens – hurricanes series opens Thursday at Lenovo Center with Carolina trying to do something only one NHL team has ever done: start the Stanley Cup Playoffs with 9 straight wins. Montreal arrives after winning two rounds the hard way, and the matchup now tests whether the Hurricanes can turn their opening run into a place in league history.
Rod Brind'Amour pushed aside the weight of Carolina’s earlier Eastern Final exits. "I don’t know. I’m kind of over all that, to be honest," he said, adding, "I get it, I get why you would talk about it. I know we’re not thinking about it."
Lenovo Center and Carolina's run
The number hanging over Game 1 is simple. The Hurricanes can become the second team in NHL history to open the playoffs with nine consecutive victories, and the 1985 Edmonton Oilers are the only club that has done it before. That Oilers team went on to win the Stanley Cup. Before Carolina, the 1969 St. Louis Blues, the 1960 Canadiens and the 1952 Detroit Red Wings had each opened the postseason with 8 straight victories.
Carolina is also chasing something it has not reached since 2006, when it won the Stanley Cup and last appeared in the Eastern Final. This is the first time the Hurricanes/Hartford Whalers franchise has reached the conference final in successive seasons, a stretch that stands out because Carolina has been eliminated in the Eastern Final three times since 2018-19, including last season against the Florida Panthers, who later won the Cup.
Montreal's path through pressure
Montreal’s path to this point was built on elimination games. The Canadiens beat the Tampa Bay Lightning in seven games in the first round, then eliminated the Buffalo Sabres in Game 7 on Monday. This series is the first in NHL history to match a team coming off back-to-back sweeps in a best-of-7 series against a team that won each of its previous two series in Game 7s.
Martin St. Louis said Montreal has already learned the lesson that fits this stage. "I think at this time of the season you have to be able to defend hard," he said. He added that the Canadiens have learned they can lose momentum, but they cannot break, and he pointed to the need to keep playing with a lead and keep their poise against strong opponents.
Noah Dobson on Carolina
Noah Dobson framed the task from Montreal’s blue line. "It’s definitely important," he said of mobile defense, then called Carolina’s forecheck "a huge part of their game." His answer for Game 1 was direct: "We’re going to need to be good on breakouts, support each other, use our legs to be able to make plays and try to break their pressure."
That is the pressure point for Montreal in this opener. Carolina has the numbers, the home ice and the chance to make history in front of it; Montreal has already survived two seven-game series and now has to carry that edge into a building where the Hurricanes have one of the clearest milestones in franchise history waiting at the end of Thursday night.
