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"I know I have to be better if we're going to win. The team relies on me a lot, and I haven't done anything the last two games." - Rod Brind'Amour
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Brind'Amour takes the heat
By Shawn P. Roarke
NHL.com Senior Writer
June 19, 2006
RALEIGH, N.C. -- The Stanley Cup Final can be a cruel mistress.
Just a week ago, Rod Brind'Amour was basking in its spotlight, just a win away from claiming hockey's
grandest prize. The Carolina captain, Brind'Amour was among the biggest reasons the Hurricanes once held a
three-games-to-one advantage in the best-of-seven series against Edmonton.
Today, as the Hurricanes prepare for an unexpected Game 7 at RBC Center, Brind'Amour is in the spotlight
for a far different reason -- his ineffectiveness. Others, mainly Edmonton Oilers like Fernando Pisani, Chris
Pronger and goalie Jussi Markkanen have become the Cup's in-fashion paramours.
In the last two games, Brind'Amour has been strangely silent in almost all aspects of the game. In the
heartbreaking OT loss in Game 5, Brind'Amour was a horrendous minus-3 in 22 minutes and 30 seconds of ice
time. In the Game 6 debacle, he managed just one shot and won only nine of 18 faceoffs in 20 minutes of ice
time.
In the solemn visitors dressing room after Game 6, Brind'Amour pointed fingers only at himself.
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"I know I have to be better if we're going to win," Brind'Amour said. "The team relies on me a lot, and I
haven't done anything the last two games. I think the team goes as I go a lot of times, and I'm not doing the
job right now."
In reality, nobody played well in Game 6. Each player in the Carolina room knows that and nobody believes
that it falls just on Brind'Amour to make Carolina's Cup dreams come true.
"There's no question that we all feed off Roddy," alternate captain Kevyn Adams said Monday morning. "But,
he's the last guy we worry about in this room. We know what he is going to bring to the game. I think if we
all look in the mirror and ask ourselves if we have more to give, if we have given it our all, then we will
be all right tonight. That's what I believe."
Adams believes that it must be a whole-team effort Monday, not just the heroics of one player -- no matter
how good he is or how much he has meant to the team this season.
"Everybody has got to pick each other up," Adams said Sunday. "It's not about Rod Brind'Amour. It's not
about (Edmonton's) Jarret Stoll. It's about each guy in this room doing their part, and that's one of the
special things about this team in here, not one guy has to be spectacular. It's just that we each need to do
our thing. And we can't hold back.
"We got to just led it rip and just go after it. I think sometimes, you know, the last two games we had
times when we were going pretty good and we had a lot of times where we were on our heels a little bit. We
were watching. We just need to go out there and just go after it now."
Coach Peter Laviolette also tried to nip the criticism of Brind'Amour in the bud. Relayed the gist of his
captain's self-recrimination Saturday night, Laviolette took the opposite tack Sunday afternoon.
"Rod is always probably a little harder on himself than anybody else," Laviolette said. "And I would agree
that we, in general, the whole team, collectively did not play our game last night.
"I don't think you will find anybody that's making a case for that. But Rod has been a rock for us all
year. I would expect him to be a rock for us tomorrow night."
Brind'Amour expects himself to be a rock, as well. He was, arguably, Carolina's MVP in the regular season
and is a leading candidate to win the Selke Trophy as the game's best defensive forward. In the postseason,
he has emerged as one of Carolina's leading candidates to cop the Conn Smythe Trophy if the Hurricanes can
pull out Game 7 on Monday night.
But for that to happen, Brind'Amour knows he must lead the way, turning in the dominant two-way game that
defined the first two games of this series in Carolina.
"Everything's got to change," Brind'Amour said Saturday night. "We've got to come out with a lot more
desire. Obviously, we've got to get to our game, which we never even established (in Game 6). Thankfully, we
have another game."
Fortunately, Brind'Amour knows it is possible. The Hurricanes lost Game 6 of the Eastern Conference Finals
to Buffalo to force a Game 7 at the RBC Center. There, Carolina, erased an early deficit and walked away with
a 4-2 win. Brind'Amour had the winning goal in that game, on the power-play, midway through the third
period.
Now, he gets another chance to be the Game 7 hero. A situation he never wanted to be in a week ago, but a
situation he knows he must embrace if he wants to make the Stanley Cup his for good.
"We knew it was going to be tough," Brind'Amour said. "It's not like we didn't know what we were in for.
Thankfully we have another game. That's the only way I'm looking at it."
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