Inside look at Carolina Hurricanes

NHL.com is providing in-depth roster, prospect and fantasy analysis for each of its 32 teams from Aug. 1.-Sept. 1. Today, the Carolina Hurricanes.

After qualifying for the Stanley Cup Playoffs the past five seasons and a productive offseason during which they secured and supplemented their core, the Carolina Hurricanes believe they are set up for the payoff.

That means not only contending for the Stanley Cup this season, but in multiple seasons to follow.

"We've gone five years making the playoffs, and I think we're right in the heart of our window to keep moving forward," general manager Don Waddell said. "… We're a franchise that doesn't want to win one Cup. We want to try to win 10 Cups, and you've got to put yourself in position to compete for the Cup every year and we think we can do that for numerous years coming up."

The Hurricanes have been pushing to add a second Stanley Cup championship to the one they won in 2006 since ending a nine-season playoff drought in 2019. They appeared on the verge of taking the next step when they reached the Eastern Conference Final last season but were swept by the Florida Panthers, scoring six goals in the best-of-7 series.

Unsatisfied, the Hurricanes were busy trying to improve their chances of getting back to and beyond that point. It began with re-signing forwards Jordan Staal (four years) and Jesper Fast (two years) and goalies Frederik Andersen (two years) and Antti Raanta (one year), retaining four key players who could've departed as unrestricted free agents.

"I liked the fact that we kept a lot of our guys that we needed to keep," coach Rod Brind'Amour said. "The questionable guys that, 'What are we doing with them?' we wanted to keep them in the fold, and we were able to do that."

After the UFA market opened July 1, Carolina strengthened its defenseman group by signing Dmitry Orlov to a two-year contract and Tony DeAngelo to a one-year deal, and added goal-scoring and what Waddell called, "a little sandpaper" with forwards Michael Bunting (three years) and Brendan Lemieux (one year).

"I think I can bring the energy, bring my skill set and be able to move the puck and get to the hard areas," said Bunting, who scored 23 goals each of the past two seasons for the Toronto Maple Leafs. "That's where I excel the most is kind of in front of the net, in the corners and distributing the puck but also being able to put it in as well."

Carolina's biggest offseason transaction was signing Sebastian Aho to an eight-year contract July 26. With the 26-year-old having one season left on his previous deal, the Hurricanes' most important forward is signed through the 2031-32 season.

After signing 23-year-olds Andrei Svechnikov (six seasons remaining) and Jesperi Kotkaniemi (seven left) to eight-year contracts in 2021 and 2022, respectively, Carolina has three important, younger forwards locked up for the long term. The Hurricanes don't have the same contractual stability at defenseman with Brett Pesce and Brady Skjei eligible to become unrestricted free agents after this season, but Jaccob Slavin, Brent Burns and Orlov are signed for the next two.

Though Burns is 38 and Staal will turn 35 on Sept. 10, most of the Hurricanes core is in its prime and eager to win.

"As a player, all you can ask, really, from the team [is] you have a chance to win, and we definitely have a chance to be the best team in the League." Aho said. "I'm really excited for the next year."

The Hurricanes have limited remaining space under the NHL salary cap but are seeking to add more scoring help. Waddell acknowledged that might involve dipping into their depth at defenseman by trading Pesce or Skjei if they aren't signed to new contracts before the season.

"We think we've had a very good offseason, not only signing the players from our team last year that we needed to bring back, but also the additions of some of the free agents we added," Waddell said. "My job as the general manager is just to stay on the phone every day and continue to look to see if we can make our team better. … I can't say anything's going to happen between now and the start of the season, but certainly we'll continue to talk to different teams and free agents and see what shakes out here."