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Friday, October 29, 1999
Hurricanes edgy before first Raleigh game
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) -- The Carolina Hurricanes might find it difficult to maintain their usual composure during the opening of the team's new arena."This is the one time that this is going to happen, and I think the players should enjoy all of it and really get wrapped up in it," coach Paul Maurice said of tonight's opening of the Raleigh Entertainment and Sports Arena.
"We've got a well composed team that I think will handle this well, but I don't want to put the clamps too tight on them and not enjoy a once-in-a-lifetime thing. These guys have earned the right to enjoy this day. They're paid the price over the last two years."
Carolina will open its new building against New Jersey after two years of playing home games at the Greensboro Coliseum 130 kilometres down Interstate 40.
"It's going to be a strange feeling," defenceman Glen Wesley said about playing in the team's new 18,700-seat arena. "You can probably go all the way back to Hartford to where we felt like we had a home -- until we found out we were leaving.
"It has been tough sleeping at night because you are so excited about coming down to the new rink and seeing the new things."
The team has been off for five days after going 4-2-3 in an NHL record-tying, nine-game road swing to start the season. Maurice said a few near fights have broken out in practice as players get edgy about starting in their new home.
"The energy is there, but we're not sure what to do with it because you can't hit in practice like you hit in the game," Maurice said.
The former Hartford Whalers left Connecticut for North Carolina following the 1996-97 season. Construction of the new building forced the team to play two years in Greensboro, where it was last in the NHL in attendance both seasons.
"A couple of times during that I-40 drive, you wondered if the end would ever come," centre Jeff O'Neill said of the 260-kilometre round trip for each home game. "But we saw the light at the end of the tunnel and we stuck together as a team. Since I came into the league, they have been talking about the Whalers moving, and for me this is the end result. I've finally got a home."
The home opener against the Devils is sold out, a rare occurrence for the Hurricanes. The team sold out only four games last season in Greensboro, where the coliseum had a black curtain lowered in the upper deck to hide empty seats.
"When guys got traded here the last few years they couldn't believe the routine, having to practice in Raleigh and then drive down to Greensboro for the pregame meal," O'Neill said. "It was just basically an inconvenience. When you're an athlete, you like to have a building to call home."
Maurice and the players hope the sport can catch on and give the team a home-ice advantage, something that was missing the past two seasons.
"We're almost a quarter of the way into our road schedule, now we have to make hay at home," said Maurice, whose team has 11 home dates in November.
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