Carolina is playing this well without Patches and Svechnikov nuff said lul

This is going to be scrappy series. Both teams don't like each other, that's pretty evident over the last few years although they have yet to face in the ploffs.

-Florida currently has the edge on the powerplay, and they do have more weapons than Carolina in that regard. Carolina is currently running 90% on the pk. However there are a couple different lenses you could look at that number through. The Islanders only scored one goal on the powerplay against Carolina. The Islanders had a pretty miserable powerplay all year so are the stats from that series that impressive? However they held New Jersey to only 2 powerplay goals, and they had a lethal powerplay, so that is also impressive.

-Florida has however been shredded on the PK through two rounds. Operating at 65%, you can attribute that to them having a bad penalty kill, or them having to face two "essentially" top 5 powerplays in Boston and Toronto.

-Will Carolina's powerplay start to click against Florida's subpar penalty kill? Or will the truth come to light, where we see Florida improve their shorthanded play and show how challenged Carolina's powerplay can be at times?

-Carolina plays very similar to Florida in terms of their suffocating forecheck. There were questions about how Carolina would fair against another great forechecking team (NYI) and against a fast transition team (NJD). They handled both pretty easily.

3 keys:

-Special teams
-Goaltending
-Road success


Carolina is 3-1 on the road despite been brutal last year. Florida has been damn near perfect, 6-1 away from Sunrise. I think Florida takes the series due to their ability to win on the road, and Carolina's inability to crack Bob.

Florida in 7

Canes edge it in seven. This series is gonna be a cage match.