The Hurricanes have hitched the franchise wagon to Eric Staal and he’s showing increased maturity in that role. Though he was effectively shut down in the Eastern Conference Final, Staal rose to the occasion in the playoffs, scoring nine goals in the first 11 postseason games.  Just as importantly, Staal put up the first plus season of his career, with a plus-15 rating in a season that saw him hit the 40-goal plateau for the second time in his career.  Staal’s late surge showed just how dangerous he can be with the right linemates.  After doing precious little for the Hurricanes in the regular season, Jussi Jokinen was a surprise playoff hero, scoring seven goals, including three game-winners and the crucial tying goal in Game Seven against New Jersey.  Erik Cole is another player the Canes will count on for offensive scoring punch, he is a fast skater who’s not afraid of contact and can put the puck in the net.

Coming off the best season of his career, during which he set career-bests in wins, goals against average, save percentage and shutouts, Ward has established himself as one of the top young goaltenders in the game.  The run to the conference finals was a preview of Ward coming into his prime.  The backup role isn’t of utmost importance, but Michael Leighton is serviceable for the dozen or so starts that are required of him.  A tad more consistency from Leighton would be nice, but it’s admittedly not easy when playing so sporadically.

The Canes have agreed to a three-year deal with right winger Tom Kostopoulos worth more than $2.7 million.  He will make $700,000 next season, $950,000 the following year and $1.1 million in the final year of the deal.  Kostopoulos will bring grit to the lineup and can help on the penalty kill.  With this signing Carolina addressed the need for a grind it out type player who will make his linemates better as well as some added toughness to a team that got pushed around a bit last year before going on a playoff run to the Eastern Conference finals. Kostopoulos had eight goals and 14 assists in 78 games with Montreal last year.

Bottom line is that if Goalie Cam Ward can have a repeat performance in 2009-2010 season and the offense comes together, then we’ll probably see a repeat of this year’s Eastern Conference finals.  However there could be a different outcome this time.

Carolina on the other hand is in all kinds of trouble.  The Canes stars have all but disappeared in this series.  Eric Staal has pretty much been a non-factor and Eric Cole is battling injuries.  Also where has Ray Whitney the Canes leading scorer in the regular season gone. He has been a complete non-factor. It’s no wonder Carolina is having trouble scoring and keeping up.  Cam Ward while he hasn’t been spectacular he also hasn’t really given up any soft goals.  He is fighting but he needs help from his defensemen and they are being overwhelmed.  Game four tonight in all likelihood will be the Hurricanes final game of the season.

Over in the Western Conference the situation isn’t really that different from the east.  The Chicago Blackhawks also have their backs up against the wall trailing the Detroit Red Wings 3-1 in the best of seven series.  The Wings have proved to be too strong for the youthful Blackhawks to overcome.  They’re going to go to the finals (sorry, Hawks) without getting top-end production from many of their top guys.  That’s what is so impressive.  No Pavel Datsyuk, no Nicklas Lidstrom, no Tomas Kopecky, no problem in Game 4.  Throughout these playoffs Chicago has played with a lot of energy and passion, they just don’t have the experience to beat a team like Detroit.  It also doesn’t help when you lose your starting goalie to  an injury.  Nikolai Khabibulin at least kept things close and gave Chicago a chance to win but without him the Hawks virtually stand no chance at winning.  This years accomplishments will set the stage for the Hawks to have successful future runs at the Stanley Cup for the next few seasons.

Check out these highlights of the best plays of the week.

The one thing I can’t seem to believe is how Cam Ward who was the driving force behind Carolina’s success has all but disappeared.  I know that it’s a team effort and that the defensemen has to help out but Ward is just not coming up with the big saves anymore.  Game after game he is being peppered with so many shots that he must be wearing down and maybe the Boston series took more out of him than any of us think.  Any way you look at it the Hurricanes are now facing elimination and all the sports cliches will be thrown around until the puck drops for the start of game four.  History isn’t on the Hurricanes’ side.  Only twice has a team rallied from a 3-0 series deficit to win a series, and it hasn’t happened since the New York Islanders did it against Pittsburgh in 1975.   The defending Eastern Conference champions can sweep the series Tuesday night.

Carolina put up a valiant effort. They kept pace with Pittsburgh until Malkin took over.  The Canes offense was well balanced getting goals from four different scorers, in the end though it was not enough.  The Hurricanes’ Cam Ward allowed six goals — the most of his playoff career ( the 7th goal was an empty netter ).  It was his 39th career playoff game and his previous high was four goals allowed.  Before tonight’s game, Ward had never started and lost a playoff game with the Hurricanes trailing in a series.  He had been 7-0 with a 1.41 GAA and two shutouts when his team trailed a series.  He is now 5-2 in Game 2’s.

The series now shifts to Carolina’s home turf for game 3 on Saturday where the Canes are difficult to beat.  If anyone is up to the task it is the Penguins young superstars.  The Penguins are trying to become the first team since the 1984 Edmonton Oilers to lose in the Stanley Cup finals one season and win the Cup the next.  The Penguins scored the most goals in a playoff game since they had seven on Apr. 13, 2000.  Meanwhile, the seven allowed by Carolina was the most in a playoff since the franchise allowed seven against the Montreal Canadiens on Apr. 27, 1992 as the Hartford Whalers in Game 5 of the division semifinals.

While the Hurricanes didn’t have the opening-game letdown that some teams experience after a series as challenging and emotionally draining as their seven-game second round against top-seeded Boston, they again lacked goals. That’s been an ongoing problem for a team that found multiple ways to pull out games in the first two rounds but averaged only 2.36 goals per game — far less than Pittsburgh’s 3.46 average.  Carolina didn’t score until more than halfway through the game when Chad LaRose beat Fluery.  The Canes scored with a minute and a half left in the game to make things interesting but Pittsburgh held on for the close win.

Carolina has now lost Game 1 in each of its three playoff series this year. But that’s not a bad thing for the Hurricanes, who have won their last five postseason series after losing the opener.  With an assist, Pens forward Sidney Crosby now has a point in 16 of his last 18 playoff games.

This will mark the first time brothers Jordan (Pittsburgh) and Eric (Carolina) Staal will face each other in the postseason  and that could provide some interesting battles as both are centers and both aren’t afraid to use their big bodies.  Eric will carry a bigger burden going into this series as Carolina’s top center and most talented player, leading the team with 13 points in 14 games this spring.  The Hurricanes have won every game in which he scored this spring, his nine goals ranked third overall heading into the conference finals.  They will need Staal to continue playing at an elite level to keep up with Pittsburgh’s young stars.  Carolina’s defensemen used their speed and skills well at both ends of the rink in their previous series yet appeared at times to struggle, resulting in costly defensive breakdowns. The tireless Joni Pitkanen has been the Hurricanes best blueliner with seven points and plus-minus of +4.  It’s safe to say Carolina wouldn’t have gotten this far without the goaltending of Cam Ward, who continues to show the form which made him the 2006 playoff MVP.  Ward’s statistics (2.22 GAA, .927 SP, two shutouts) are one of the main reasons for the Canes resurgence, they missed the playoffs the last two years.

This is a very tough team who now faces the the Pittsburgh Penguins in the Eastern Conference Finals.  This is going to be a great series.  Pittsburgh has the recognizable star power but Carolina has their own stars, both these teams are very evenly matched.  Their is a lot of speed that will be on display when these two lock horns.  The matchup pits last years Stanley Cup finalist Pittsburgh versus the team that won the Stanley Cup two seasons ago, so we can all expect to see a long drawn out war.  I’m having a tough time making a prediction on who will win the series and earn the right to play for Lord Stanley’s Cup.  Carolina finished the regular season on a roll and captured the No. 6 seed in the East.  They upset New Jersey in the first round by winning the last two games, including scoring the tying and winning goals in the final 80 seconds of Game 7.  One thing is for sure, this is going to be a great display of playoff hockey from two exceptionally talented and experienced teams.

Finally, that’s what the Detroit Red Wings are saying after beating the Anaheim Ducks 4-3 to give them a 4-3 series victory.  The pesky 8th seeded Ducks gave Detroit all it could handle but in the end it was a little dribbler by Daniel Cleary that got past Ducks goalie Jonas Hiller that sealed the victory for the Wings.  The win will send the defending Stanley Cup champions to the Western Conference finals for the third straight year.  The Red Wings and the Blackhawks will meet in the playoffs for the first time since the 1995 Western Conference finals.  Detroit won that series 4-1.   The Red Wings have advanced to at least the conference finals eight times in the last 14 seasons, winning the Cup in 1997, ‘98, 2002 and ‘08.

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The Boston Bruins evened the Eastern Conference semifinals sending the series back to Boston for a decisive seventh game by beating Carolina 4-2 Tuesday night.  The Bruins who were down 3 games to one have rallied to keep their season alive.  For the second time in the last three games, Mark Recchi opened the scoring for Boston.  He added an assist in the second period for his first multi-point postseason game since 2007.  Goaltender Tim Thomas was solid in net, it was a complete team effort that got it done for the Bruins.  Carolina seems to have fallen apart losing three straight times but I wouldn’t turn my back on these guys just yet.  A good game by Eric Staal Or Eric Cole and Boston’s season is over.  Another quick fact, Cam Ward has never lost a playoff series in his career.  All this makes for a very exciting and interesting game 7 on Thursday night.

Check us out on Twitter @hockeylicious  for updates throughout the day.

The Detroit Red Wings are one win away from making their third straight Western Conference finals appearance after defeating the Anaheim Ducks 4-1.  Johan Franzen scored his seventh goal of the postseason to give the Red Wings an early 1-0 lead in the 2nd period and then Henrik Zetterberg took over setting up Detroit’s next two goals and sealing the game with a goal of his own into an empty net.  Franzen however has been The Red Wings most solid performer in the series with 5 goals.  The Ducks will have to physically engage the 6-foot-3, 220-pound Franzen, whose nickname is Mule is constantly finding holes and taking a lot of good shots leading to scores.

Ryan Whitney scored Anaheim’s lone goal, it was his first goal since joining the Ducks and his first since Feb. 16 when he was with the Penguins.  Ryan Getzlaf was held without a point, ending an eight-game point streak.  Jonas Hiller will need to rebound on tuesday night for game six if the Ducks have any hope of extending the best of seven series.

Detroit allowed just 17 shots, its fewest in a playoff game since the 2007 Western Conference quarterfinals when it gave up 15 to Calgary.  Johan Franzen’s goal gave him 20 goals over the last two postseasons, which leads the NHL.

It seems like history is possibly looking to repeat itself.  Once again after taking a two game lead in a series against Pittsburgh, the Washington Capitals dropped their second straight time to allow the Penguins to tie up the other Eastern Conferences semi-final series at 2-2.  After Washington’s  Nicklas Backstrom scored less than a minute into the game, Pittsburgh ran off three straight goals in the first period and never trailed again.  Sidney Crosby scored his postseason-leading ninth goal and added an assist to lead the Penguins offense.  Caps Goalie Simeon Varlamov didn’t bring his A game and it showed, 4 of the 5 goals he let in were a little soft, only Crosby’s goal was really pretty. Also after scoring five goals in the first three games of the series, Capitals sniper Alex Ovechkin seemed to disappear as he was held without a goal in Game 4.  The Penguins are now in position to again do what they did against the Capitals in 1992 and 1996 by rallying to win after being down 2-0 in a series.  Pittsburgh has a major worry though, as Sergei Gonchar was helped off the ice late in the first period after absorbing a knee-on-knee hit from Ovechkin.  There was no immediate word about the injury, or how long it would sideline the Penguins’ most experienced defenseman.  The Pens will need him healthy to pull out a series victory.  Game 5 is in Washington tonight.