Canes Win 3-2

I went to my first hockey game of 2009 last night. It was a battle between old rivals, the New Jersey Devils and The Carolina Hurricanes. These are usually good games, and last night was no exception.

The score really doesn't reflect the dominance of the Canes in this game. They came out in the first period with so much pep and drive. It was one of the best periods of hockey I have seen from the Canes in a long time. The game was actually 3-0 Canes until about 10 minutes left in the 3rd period.

The Devils did something I haven't seen before last night. They went on a power play with less than 10 minutes left in the 3rd period. At that point, they were still down by 3 goals. They pulled their goalie for a sixth attacker. They didn't score on that PP, but did on the following. Usually, you would only see the goalie pulled in the last minutes of a game, and normally when there is only a 1 goal difference. Apparently, this is a new strategy being tried in the NHL. It made the game interesting. Time will tell if this idea sticks.