RALEIGH — After the morning skate Saturday at the RBC Center, new Hurricanes coach Paul Maurice managed expectations for Saturday night's home game against the Philadelphia Flyers.
"We cannot look at this as if we win this game tonight, all is right with our team and our world," said Maurice. "This has to be a progression of where we want to get to consistently. And the one thing we've talked about now is the consistency is the area we have to get to."
Maurice referenced the 5-2 loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins on Thursday, his first game at the helm since Peter Laviolette was fired as coach Wednesday.
"So, had we beat Pitt and played a game we can't replicate, it would have meant nothing," said Maurice. "So the two points, yeah, we understand that when you are in this point in the standings in the Eastern Conference, every game is huge. "
Maurice said he's been through the pressure to win before, and he's less concerned with that at the moment.
"First and foremost I want the offensive zone to look like it's supposed to, the neutral zone to look like it's supposed to, and we'll be making steps towards that because if we can replicate the game, then we can be a good team. But if we can't, if [Eric] Staal gets lucky tonight and fires three in the net and we can't do it again, then it doesn't mean anything to our team."
Javier Serna has covered sports for The News & Observer since 2007. He previously covered growth for the North Raleigh News, and sports at The Truth in Elkhart, Ind. E-mail 
Comments
Replicate?
Sat, 12/06/2008 - 16:57 — lbloomerReplication is futile. Just keep the puck out of our net and try to score more than 2 goals. And try, for Jeebus' sake, try to score first for a change.