The Carolina Hurricanes dropped the opening game of the Eastern Conference Final, losing 5-2 to the Florida Panthers Tuesday night at Lenovo Center.

The Hurricanes, who are now 0-13 over the course of their last four Conference Final appearances, just didn't look prepared for the Panthers.

The overall team defense was lacking and there just wasn't the same edge that they had had in prior rounds.

Sure they brought some physicality, but the full-team effort in defending and forechecking was just nowhere to be seen.

Florida on the other hand looked just like they were just continuing on from their dominant Game 7 win over the Toronto Maple Leafs just 48 hours earlier.

The Panthers just did everything the Canes want to do, but better.

They scored on the power play (twice), they had a perfect penalty kill until the Canes scored a meaningless PPG in garbage time, they capitalized on their chances, their goaltending was better, they protected the front of the net better, they completed passes better, escaped pressure better, and I could go on.

The Panthers looked the composed, veteran team, and I mean, they should. They're the defending Cup champions.

But Carolina is a veteran heavy group too. They're a team that hardly ever gets rattled, but tonight was a different story.

Cumulative mistakes just burned them time and time again and now, they're staring up at a series deficit against an opponent that seemingly just has their number.

The Panthers opened up the scoring on the power play, following a soft call on Sebastian Aho.

Carter Verhaeghe found the soft spot in the Canes' trapezoid and roofed a backhand top shelf over Frederik Andersen's shoulder.

The Hurricanes almost tied it not long after after Shayne Gostisbehere broke Tomas Nosek's ankles and found Logan Stankoven backdoor for an easy tap-in, but Seth Jones got enough of the rookie to prevent the chance.

Immediately after, Jordan Staal turns over a puck deep in the defensive zone and Evan Rodrigues fed Aaron Ekblad for the score.

Carolina found some life at the end of the first period, as Aho redirected a shot off of his skates and through Sergei Bobrovsky's five-hole, but Florida pounced right back to start the second with A.J. Greer finishing off a feed by Niko Mikkola on a 3-on-2.

Then nearly halfway through the third period, the Panthers pushed the lead to three with another power play goal as Sam Bennett put one in through traffic, and then Eetu Luostarinen added another, burying a no-look feed from Nosek.

At the very least, Jackson Blake put home a Seth Jarvis feed from in front on a late power play to make it look a little less embarrassing.

The Hurricanes had a chance to really battle back in the third period, only trailing by two, but it was just a disappointing and lackluster effort from them.

Now, they have to hope that A) Jalen Chatfield is healthy enough to go because Scott Morrow did not have a playoff debut to remember and B) they get their act together or this series may get very familiar, very fast now that they've lost home-ice advantage.

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