Carolina drops fourth in a row

On Thursday night, Carolina lost its fourth game in a row and the seventh in their last ten. They went to Ottawa hoping to turn the ship around and climb back into first place in the Southeast. Unfortunately, they were going up against the best team in the Eastern Conference, and they continued to play like the worst team in the entire league.

The final tally was 5-1, but really it felt like 10-0.

Like a badly overmatched college basketball team, they took a lot of low percentage shots from long distance and bad angles. Their shot total was high, but like so many times this year, very few of their shots were quality. 99.44% of the time when you shoot the puck right at the crest on the goaltender's chest, it isn't going to find its way in the net.

Without any intention to discredit Ottawa, Carolina didn't play well. They haven't played well in a few weeks. Months, even. Their forechecking is non-existent, their backchecking a joke, their penalty killing dreadful, and so on. There is absolutely zero creativity in their playmaking and shot selection. The defensemen take too many stupid penalties. The goaltending hasn't been great, but more often than we'd like, the goaltender is hung out to dry.

Ray Whitney scored a five-on-three power play, which was the only thing remotely positive in this game. Carolina had thirtysomething shots, but probably 25 of those came from above the faceoff circles with no traffic in front.

Carolina will have a chance to end this horrible skid with a home game against the Oilers on Friday night. Edmonton played and won in Atlanta on in Washington Thursday, so neither team will be rested.