Most of the talk surrounding the Carolina Hurricanes right now is centered around how well some of their top forwards are playing right now. Eric Staal is off to his best start in quite some time, Alexander Semin has been producing well and so have both Jordan Staal and Jeff Skinner. The fact that these four are providing most of the offense is a good thing because the Hurricanes need them to produce if they are going to have a chance at the playoffs. They can't be the only ones producing, though because they are going to have off-nights and that's where the rest of the team needs to pitch in. So far, that hasn't been happening.

I mentioned a couple weeks ago that the Buffalo Sabres were going to run into trouble because they had one line doing basically all the work. The Hurricanes aren't too far off from being in that territory as their top-six has been on-ice for all but one even strength goal and their first line has produced about 36% of their total goals on the season. Again, it's good to see the top-six doing their job but not having much scoring depth is going to hurt the team eventually.

I made a few pie-graphs to show just how skewed Carolina's offense has been this year and it really illustrates how much the top-six is being leaned on, especially the first line.

One of the reasons why the Hurricanes acquired Jordan Staal this summer is because he is the type of player who can make the rest of your roster better. We've been over this hundreds of times before, but J. Staal's ability to drive the play and create offense despite playing the toughest minutes on the team allows Kirk Muller to free up some of his other lines to easier minutes. We've seen Muller utilize this strategy by giving Jordan Staal's line the majority of tough minutes while Eric Staal's line has gotten easier zone starts against secondary competition and the third line of Jussi Jokinen, Chad LaRose and Drayson Bowman have gotten some of the "easiest" assignments on the team.

In theory, this strategy makes a lot of sense because the Staal brothers are good enough to handle the toughs and Jokinen was able to efficiently move the puck forward last year in a similar, protected role. So far, one side of this plan has worked out well as Eric Staal's line has done a marvelous job of creating offense and scoring chances but the third line has struggled. One would think that Jokinen, LaRose and Bowman should be able to thrive in a third line role where they aren't being matched up the best that the opposing team has to offer but they haven't been getting the job done. No one on this line has a point yet this season and all three are on the losing end of the scoring chance battle at even strength.

The most alarming thing about their performance thus far is the fact that they haven't been able to push the play forward despite the easier assignments they've been receiving. That and they've been pretty brutal at both ends of the ice in terms of creating and preventing scoring chances.

Jamie McBain's goal on Monday night's game against the Boston Bruins was a bit of a milestone for the Hurricanes. Not only was it the young defenseman's first goal of the season, but it was also the first time all year that the Hurricanes scored in the first period. That's right, it took five games into the year for the Hurricanes to finally score in the first period and they've scored the opening goal only once in those five games, too.

Obviously, this is a very small sample size to work with and it could end up not meaning a lot in the big picture, but I think most Carolina fans would agree that this team has had a problem with slow starts this year. They've been outscored 1-8 in first periods this year and have spent the majority of three games battling back from holes that they dug themselves into. Just what is going wrong for the Canes at the beginning of games, though? Some might say that the team has a tendency to come out sleeping for the first ten minutes like they did in the Bruins game on Monday but getting into penalty trouble is what sunk them against the Florida Panthers on opening night.

Whatever the case is, the Hurricanes really need to start playing better in the opening 20 minutes because a poor start usually sets the tone for the rest of the game. I've mentioned before that the Hurricanes play at 5-on-5 has been pretty solid this year but it would mean a lot more if the team wasn't playing from behind for most of their games. Teams usually outshoot the opposition when they are playing from behind so Carolina having the advantage in shots and scoring chances during even strength play would mean a lot more if they were either tied or leading for most of their games.

Just what is the root of the problem for the Hurricanes in the first period, though? After the jump, we will take a look at how Carolina has played in the first 20 minutes compared to the rest of the game to see if we can find any answers.

Hockey was indeed alive and well in North Carolina during the lockout, as the Charlotte Checkers got off to one of their best starts in team history and have the second best record in the AHL at 23-11-2-3. Their performance during the lockout was very promising for the Hurricanes organization because most of Charlotte's top players were younger players who the Hurricanes drafted. Developing talent in the minor leagues is always important in running a successful franchise, so it was great to see guys like Zach Boychuk, Drayson Bowman, Zac Dalpe and Bobby Sanguinetti excel in Charlotte during the lockout. 

The Checkers receiving the bulk of their production from guys who are on the cusp of being ready for the NHL is somewhat of a double-edged sword in a way, though. It was good to see these players perform well during the work stoppage, but most people knew that these players were going to get their shot in the NHL once it returned. This would lead to a massive talent purge on the Checkers and put the team in a rough spot depending on how many players the Hurricanes decided to call-up. Charlotte isn't in the same boat as Oklahoma City where virtually all of their best players will be going to the NHL, but they could potentially lose some key pieces once the NHL season begins.

Charlotte had to play two games this weekend without the services of Zach Boychuk, Tim Wallace, Dan Ellis, Drayson Bowman, Jeremy Welsh and Bobby Sanguinetti and they could potentially lose a few more players depending on who else is called up, who makes the Hurricanes and who gets lost on waivers. Add in the injuries to Rasmus Rissanen, Jerome Samson and Marc-Andre Gragnani and there could be some tough times ahead for the Checkers. 

That's the risk you take when you have so many players in their early to mid-20's playing in the minor leagues. The AHL acts as a developmental league but it's easy to forget that the Checkers are an independent franchise just like the Hurricanes and they have their own goals to ice a competitive and successful team. The Canes could potentially take a lot of talent away from the Checkers (9 players in total were called up) depending on what happens over the next week.

Just what are the Checkers going to be left when all is said and done, though? To find out, we will take a closer look at how Charlotte's players have been performing this year and discuss who will have to fill in for some of the pieces they will be losing to the NHL very soon.

While the Southeast is going to be far from the strongest division in the NHL this year, there is a good chance that it might be the most competitive. The Florida Panthers managed to dethrone the Washington Capitals as the incumbent champs last season and both of these teams appear to be weaker on paper heading into this year. Meanwhile, the other three teams in the Southeast made improvements last year and the race for the top spot could be much more entertaining than people are expecting. The 48-game season will also play a role in that because every game is going to mean much more than it does in a normal year.

I feel like the Southeast Division is arguably the hardest to predict in the NHL this season with every team being relatively close talent-wise, but something that will go a long way to determining who wins it will be how these teams play against each other. All teams will be playing within their conferences this year and 18 of those games will be intra-division. Divisional play is going to take up over 37% of the schedule which means that those wins (or points) will be even more important than usual. This could be a problem for the Hurricanes, who won only 9 of 24 divisional games last season, but this is shaping up to be a different team and a different division than it was in 2011-12.

Carolina should be better than they were a season ago and that could help them pick up some more wins against divisional foes, but let's keep in mind that they aren't the only team that improved this off-season. I mentioned earlier that both the Winnipeg Jets and Tampa Bay Lightning also have stronger rosters and while the Florida Panthers and Washington Captials are weaker, the Hurricanes won only one game against the Panthers last year and the Caps are always a dangerous team. In other words, the Southeast could go in just about any direction. 

Just how bad was Carolina's divisional play last year, though? Find out after the jump.

Yet another month has gone by without an NHL season but there are still many players on the Hurricanes roster and prospect pool who are currently playing in other leagues. The last time I wrote an update on this, Jiri Tlusty and his point-per-game scoring rate in the Czech League was leading the way. He has been given the luxury of playing on a line with Tomas Plekanec and Jaromir Jagr, so he is definitely benefiting from strong linemates but his scoring line is still impressive. He could potentially see a return to top-six minutes in Carolina once the lockout ends with Tuomo Ruutu being injury and opening up a wing spot on the top two lines. Tlusty's success overseas is a tad surprising for those who thought his breakout season was a fluke and we look forward to what he can do once he and the Hurricanes return.

Who else on the Hurricanes roster and prospect pool is performing well during the lockout, though? Find out after the jump.

Tracking zone entries are something that I have touched on briefly in past articles but have yet to do any serious posts on for the Hurricanes to explain why I am doing this. Part of the reason for this is because I am currently doing a major project from last season and do not have enough data on the team for me to do a substantive post about them. That will come at a later time. For now, I thought it would be a good idea to show what exactly I'm doing with this project and how it correlates to success on the ice.

The main goal behind tracking zone entries is finding out which teams are controlling the neutral zone, how they are entering the zone and how well they perform territorially after getting the puck in. There are other methods but generally, the two most common ways that teams enter the opposing zone are either by dumping the puck in or carrying it in themselves. The whole "dump and chase" method is something that you'll hear a lot of color analysts talk about as one of the "keys to victory" for their team because it's a safe way to get the puck in deep. Carolina's color analyst often puts emphasis on "good dumps," whatever the hell that means.

While dumping the puck in presents less chance for a turnover, there hasn't been much evidence to show that it leads to success in terms of generating shots or scoring chances. In fact, past studies have indicated quite the opposite and it makes sense when you think about it. Teams who simply dump the puck in are essentially giving the puck back to the other team in their own zone. Unless they play in a system that puts emphasis on strong forechecking and creating turnovers, this method doesn't seem like the best for success, especially if you're playing from behind. 

In my years of watching the Hurricanes, I have noticed that they tend to play "dump and chase" a lot and it could be one of the reasons why this team has been so poor territorially over the last three years or so. I will have a better idea of this once I have more games tracked but to show you what exactly I'm doing with this project, I will go over one of Carolina's game from last season and show how much the team's zone entries correlated with the amount of shots and scoring chances they generated. 

The game is Carolina's 3-2 shootout loss to the Ottawa Senators from last October. Why did I pick this game? Because it's where I am currently at in the season right now and featured a lot of even strength play. I thought it would serve as a good introduction to this project, which we will start after the jump.

Earlier this week, it was announced that Philippe Paradis was being assigned to the ECHL by the Chicago Blackhawks/Rockford Ice Hogs. You may remember that Paradis was the Hurricanes first round pick from the 2009 NHL Draft and was traded to the Toronto Maple Leafs later on in the year in exchange for Jiri Tlusty. Seeing how Tlusty has emerged as a top-six player and is currently playing well overseas while Paradis has struggled at just about every professional level, I think most would agree that the Hurricanes won this deal by a landslide. This did get me thinking about what kind of shape the Hurricanes prospect pool would be in had they kept Paradis and how Rutherford and the Canes scouting staff has had a lot of tough luck when it comes to drafting during their tenure.

Would you believe that since the year 2000, there have been only eight draft picks by the Hurricanes who went onto play 100 or more games for the team? Would you also believe that behind Eric Staal, Niclas Wallin has played the most games in a Carolina sweater among players drafted by Rutherford? Well, it's true. Not every team can be as good as the Detroit Red Wings when it comes to drafting younger talent, but the Hurricanes had some very rough drafts from 2000 through 2009. Aside from landing Cam Ward, Eric Staal and Brandon Sutter, there were not a lot of great players to come out of those drafts at all.

Now with that being said, the Hurricanes were still a reasonably competitive team during most of those years and this was mostly due to Rutherford being able to acquire talent through trades rather than the draft. If you were to look at just about any of Rutherford's moves during the last 10-12 years or so, it's pretty easy to see that he is more of a "play for the present" kind of guy and doesn't like to have his team sit through long rebuilding periods. He has shown that he isn't afraid to trade away draft picks from proven talent and would rather take a risk on a somewhat seasoned prospect rather than drafting one who is a few years or so away from the NHL. The recent trades involving Jordan Staal, Riley Nash and Bobby Sanguinetti indicate that and so do the trades he made during the 2005-06 year when Carolina won the Stanley Cup.

Trading away draft picks is something that a lot of GM's are reluctant to do but in the end, those picks are only as valuable as the team's scouring department, as it has been proven over the years that some organizations have an eye for finding talent in the later round of the draft. The Hurricanes, unfortunately, have not been one of those teams for most of the last decade and Rutherford seemed to notice this somewhere down the line and began to use a lot of his draft picks as trading chips. Some may not like this strategy but draft picks are never a sure thing and Rutherford was able to turn some of Carolina's picks into pieces the team could use to make the team immediately better.

The most pointed at example of Rutherford's trading is the deal that sent Keith Primeau and a 5th round pick to Philadelphia in exchange for future captain Rod Brind'Amour but there are actually a few more that really stick out. The Canes had to send five of their draft picks away to bring Doug Weight, Marc Recchi and Anton Babchuk to Carolina during their Cup run and I think just about everyone will tell you that they were well worth the price, and that's before you consider that the only current NHL-er to come from those picks is James Reimer. A couple other trades to mention is the Matt Cullen deal from 2008 where the Canes sent their third round pick from 2008 to the Rangers to acquire him and the Aaron Ward trade from 2002 where Carolina got him from Detroit for a second round pick. Both of those players ended up being more than just rentals for the Hurricanes and played important roles in their post-season success, albeit in separate years.

Rutherford's strategy changed a little bit once 2010 rolled along. The team's core was aging and there were not many younger players to take their place outside of Eric Staal. Knowing that the organization needed young talent and that they were going to end up with a high draft pick, Rutherford elected to trade away some of his older players on expiring contracts in exchange for picks. Since then, the team's drafting has gotten better and it also helped that he used a few of those picks to acquire some other younger talent like Riley Nash and Bobby Sanguinetti who were far closer to being NHL ready than most kids in the draft.

Then you have the Jordan Staal trade, which shows Rutherford going back to his older ways of trying to win now rather than waiting out another rebuilding year. I'm still not sure if Staal's value will equate to what Rutherford gave up, but this isn't the first time that he has traded away a first rounder or a high draft pick before. Seeing how the best player taken with a pick that Rutherford traded away was Jiri Hudler back in 2002, I don't think the Canes have too much to worry about on that front. Carolina still does not possess a top-notch prospect pool but they do have a lot of young talent who are on the verge of being NHL-ready, so it will be interesting to see what happens with these players and what Rutherford does in future drafts. The lockout is going to put even more pressure on a team like Carolina to play for the present, so we could see some interesting moves up his sleeve once if the NHL season resumes.

Another month has gone by without the NHL but some the Hurricanes players have been busy playing hockey in different leagues overseas. As of this post, there are now five players on the Hurricanes roster who are playing in European leagues to stay fresh during the lockout with Jamie McBain being the latest addition. The young defenseman decided to go on a short-stint with the Lahti Pelicans of Finland's SM-Liiga at the beginning of the month. He initially planned to stay for only a few games but it looks like he may stick around for a bit longer now that the lockout has gone into December. Jussi Jokinen also decided to extend his stay in Finland by playing a few more games with SM-Liiga's Karpat HC this month.

Now that these players have some more games under their belt, we'll take an updated look at what their performance would look like if they were in the NHL during this time using Gabe Desjardins' NHL equivalency values. If you need a refresher on what those are, I outlined it in last month's post on this topic.

We'll move onto this month after the jump.

Something you may have noticed is that I haven't posted any updates on Carolina's NCAA prospects in a couple weeks. The reason for this is because there are usually only two games per weekend in the college rankings and with only five players to track, there isn't much to say about them unless they had a big performance. This is especially true if you don't have a chance to watch any of their games, which has been the case for me and the Hurricanes NCAA prospects this year. That is, until last night when I tuned into NBC Sports to watch the Wisconsin/Denver game featuring Carolina's 2012 fifth round draft pick Brendan Woods. 

Woods isn't one of the team's highly regarded prospects and he is only a borderline top-six player on a struggling Wisconsin Badgers squad, but getting a closer look at him to dissect the pros and cons of his playing style is never a bad thing. Watching this game also gives us a chance to look at some other team's prospects as there were many NHL draft picks playing in this game and keep an eye on some players who might be entering the draft this summer. This also gives me a chance to finally do some statistical tracking with college hockey, which is something that's been on my to-do list for awhile. Better late than never, I suppose. 

After the jump, I will breakdown the Denver/Wisconsin game a little bit and point out some things in Woods' performance that stood out to me.