Hurricanes Facing Goalie Questions With Mrazek Day-to-Day

RALEIGH, N.C. — Rod Brind’Amour considers himself lucky to have two goalies he trusts. It looks like he is turning to the second one.

The first legitimate goalie dilemma of the playoffs belongs to the Carolina Hurricanes, now that starter Petr Mrazek is dealing with a lower body injury that has him day to day.

With Mrazek unlikely to start Game 3 against the New York Islanders on Wednesday night (7 p.m. EDT, NBCSN), the Hurricanes will try to take a 3-0 series lead behind what could be the first playoff start for journeyman Curtis McElhinney in his 11-year career.

“I think what it is is a luxury that we have a guy that we have equal confidence in,” Brind’Amour said Tuesday. “Thankfully, we have that situation. … We have a guy that we all trust who’s been good all year. It’s not like we’re hoping he’s going to be good.”

Goalie Depth in 2019 Playoffs

There hasn’t been much instability at that position across the league during this post-season, which makes sense — teams generally don’t make the playoffs with shaky goaltending. Carolina became the third team to use multiple goalies, and there wasn’t even a whiff of controversy for the two other teams making in-game moves.

The Dallas Stars find themselves in the same situation they were in the first round of the Western Conference playoffs, down 2-1 in the series going into Game 4 at home.

Dallas came back against Nashville with three wins in a row to wrap up that series in six games.

“The team knows how to respond,” said Stars top-line centre Tyler Seguin.

While the Stars have been good on special teams, with a power play goal and a short-hander in Game 3, St. Louis outscored them 4-1 in 5-5 situations on Monday night and has a 7-3 advantage in the series at full strength.

Stars coach Jim Montgomery knows “5-on-5 is how you’re going to win in the playoffs, and that’s the area of the game that we need to improve upon.”

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AP Sports Writer Stephen Hawkins in Dallas and AP freelancer Denis Gorman in New York contributed to this report.

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Joedy McCreary, The Associated Press