Carolina Hurricanes Will Be Big Game Hunting This Season

The Carolina Hurricanes are in a very unique spot that teams are rarely in. They are a true Stanley Cup contender, but have a lot of cap space to work with and make at least one big addition this season. The team has made a run at a high-end player each of the past two seasons and acquired one: first Jake Guentzel and then Mikko Rantanen last season.

In the offseason, the Hurricanes went after Nikolaj Ehlers and landed him, but they still have over $8 million in cap space to utilize this season. According to Darren Dreger, "I think (GM Tulsky's) going to be aggressive in every way possible, especially in talking about some of the best forwards that could be available."

The Hurricanes have a massive amount of injuries to Jaccob Slavin, K'Andre Miller, Shayne Gostisbehere, Pyotr Kochetkov, William Carrier, and Eric Robinson, but have played through that so far and the next up mentality is working as there are plenty of talented prospects in the system. Assuming the team will be healthy, there is room to upgrade and finally get over the hump to win the Stanley Cup, so that appears to be the plan for Carolina this season.

A spot that Jesperi Kotkaniemi holds can absolutely be upgraded with the amount of money the team has. There are already rumblings and rumors about players who are likely to get traded, such as Evgeni Malkin and Nazem Kadri, to name a couple, so expect the Hurricanes to check in with every team that has a potential high-end player potentially on the move.

The Hurricanes have made the playoffs in eight straight seasons under Rod Brind'Amour and have gotten out of the first round in seven of them. They are right there and aren't sitting back to be eliminated in another second round or conference finals.