Don’t look now, but the Carolina Hurricanes are making a little bit of a push in the Eastern Conference.
After their 5-2 win over Buffalo on Friday night, the Hurricanes have now won four of their past five games (including wins over Columbus, Boston and St. Louis) and are now three points back of the Philadelphia Flyers for the second wild card spot with still two games in hand and two head-to-head matchups remaining.
Given their current point paces, the Flyers are on track to reach the 93-point mark this season, while the Hurricanes are just a little bit below on a pace for 92 points. A playoff spot, as of this moment entering the second half of the season, is certainly within reach.
Leading the way for the Hurricanes right now is winger Jeff Skinner.
With his two-goal effort in Friday’s win, he has now had consecutive three-point games and has picked up eight points in his past five games. That has helped put him on track for a career season in Carolina that really isn’t getting much attention.
Skinner has always been a productive player (he has two 30-goal seasons before age 24 in the NHL) but he is taking it to a new level this season. He is currently on pace for 34 goals and 70 points this year, all of which would be new personal bests. This should not be a huge shock because even though it seems like he has been around forever (and this is already his seventh season in the NHL) he is just now entering the portion of his career where scorers hit their peak production, something we noted back in August during our Hurricanes preview day.
For Skinner, that peak production is putting him among the NHL’s current elites when it comes to goal and point production.
The only players to hit the 34/70 marks a season ago were Sidney Crosby, Alex Ovechkin, Patrick Kane, Jamie Benn, Vladimir Tarasenko, and Joe Pavelski.
This season the only players other than Skinner on pace for it are are Crosby, Ovechkin, Tarasenko, Jeff Carter, Cam Atkinson, Auston Matthews, Mark Scheifele and Patrik Laine (though, Laine’s injury probably takes him out of that running).
Skinner’s name always seemed to get mentioned in trade rumors in recent seasons, but fortunately for the Hurricanes they have remained just that. Rumors. Because you’re probably not going to find many other players in their mid-20s that produce like he does and are still signed for two more full seasons at less than $6 million per year.
The Hurricanes are at the halfway point and they are still very much in the playoff race. Skinner’s career year has been a big reason why.