Canes look to re-establish identity

By Lethbridge Herald on November 27, 2024.

Herald Photo by Justin Seward Lethbridge Hurricanes Luke Cozens and Tristen Doyle battle during a small area games drill during practice at Henderson arena on Wednesday.

By Justin Seward

Lethbridge Herald

The Lethbridge Hurricanes are coming off a U.S. Division where they earned a single point in three games and are using this week to re-establish their identity.

“I thought we had it on our US trip in spurts but not for 60 minutes, and guys are well aware of that and that’s something we’ve tried to work on all week in order to be able to go out and play two solid games on the road (this weekend),” said Bill Peters, Canes head coach.

The Canes struggled with bump-up shifts and momentum swings on the trip.

“We (have) got to do a better job of handling that and having composure,” said Peters.

“We lost our composure at times and gave up multiple goals in a short period of time and that’s something that we got to grow out of.”

Peters said the focus has to come back.

“We (have) got to be sharper mentally and physically and we (have) got to be emotionally engaged in the game,” said Peters.

The Hurricanes were edged in the special teams battle as their opponents went 4-for-13 and they went 2-for-11 on the powerplay.

“A little bit sloppy,” said Peters.

“We’ve made some changes on the powerplay units and we’ve had a focus on the PK (penalty kill). So I expect them to be real good and get back to where we were.”

Trae Johnson thinks the team will need to handle adversity better during their road games when something goes wrong.

“In Everett, I thought we were playing really good … and they scored that shorthanded goal and it kind of just took us a way for a little bit,” said Johnson.

“I thought it was not the worst game but yeah just kind of handling that adversity to keep our game going the whole game.”

The nine-games in nine different cities  on the road in November concludes this weekend in Saskatoon and Prince Albert on Friday and Saturday respectively.

“When we talked about it early in the week, they’re (Saskatoon’s) home record’s spectacular,  they’re overall record’s really good and they’ve had a three or four-year run of high-end hockey where they went deep into the playoffs,” said Peters.

The Canes then will face a Prince Albert Raiders team that are 7-2-1 in their last 10 games.

The Canes road record is at 4-6-0-1 and have an overall record of 12-8-1-1.

Their next home game is Dec. 3 versus the Moose Jaw Warriors.