This morning, Rod Brind'Amour was asked what his group needed to do to get back in the win column.
"We need something good to happen."
After his team's performance Tuesday night, Brind'Amour can pick and choose from all the good that happened as the Carolina Hurricanes defeated the Ottawa Senators 4-1 to snap a four-game losing streak.
"We were just a little more dialed in," Brind'Amour said. "It's such a fine line between winning and losing. Doing the little things right, which I think we did here tonight for the most part, and then you get pucks to go in. It's just weird how that works."
Special teams was the biggest difference in the game, with the power play scoring on both opportunities and the penalty kill going a perfect four-for-four.
"Special teams was the difference obviously," Brind;Amour said. "That's what I'm talking about in this game. One little bounce one way or another and the game flips, or one save or not save."
It was also a key bounce back game for a few players, but namely Sebastian Aho, who finished the game with two goals and three points, and Pyotr Kochetkov, who stopped 31 of 32 shots in the win.
"He made some huge saves," Aho said on Kochetkov. "He kept us in the game, especially early. Not a lot of rebounds, he froze pucks pretty well. Played pretty well with his stick as well. Helped get the puck up with the D. Just a great game by him and hopefully he can build some confidence off of this."
Things got tense early as Ottawa took a 1-0 lead on a deflected puck in front. In addition, forward Jordan Martinook left with an apparent injury after crashing into the goal post right before the goal against.
But before the first ended, the Hurricanes were awarded a power play and the team cashed in with Martin Necas blasting a Brady Skjei feed past Ottawa netminder Joonas Korpisalo.
The turning point in the game came in the first half of the second period though.
Carolina took back-to-back penalties and Ottawa could have really put the Canes in a tight spot, but PK and the PKers played lights out.
Following those kills, the Canes got another power play of their own and they didn't need long.
Tony DeAngelo, who was in the lineup for the first time since Nov. 18, was back quarterbacking the first power play and had a little give and go with Sebastian Aho, before the Finnish center took the puck and ripped it in past a Seth Jarvis screen.
"I think our effort has been there, but our execution hasn't," Jarvis said. "There's been a lot of inconsistencies that we've had. I think tonight, everything kind of fell into place and clicked. The power play makes a huge difference when we can score multiple times. It really kills the momentum for them."
That's about when the wheels fell off for the Senators.
A little over a minute later, Aho and Jarvis connected for a goal following a terrible Ottawa line change and then not too much longer after that, Aho rifled home his second of the night cruising down the slot.
"We want to come out flying," Jarvis said on the second period. "We knew being tied in this build is good, but we had some work to do and I think we had a really good second and we were able to shut it down in the third and come out with the win."
While the Canes would pretty much cruise through the remainder of the game, there was still a bit of excitement left in the contest.
Late in the third, Ottawa nearly scored after Brady Tkachuk picked up a pass in tight and as it trickled close to the line with Kochetkov out of commission, Jordan Staal arrived to halt it right on the line.
But wait, there was more.
The officials ruled that Kochetkov threw his stick at the puck (in actuality, Tkachuk knocked it out of his hand by barreling in) and a penalty shot was awarded.
Tkachuk skated in, but a vintage Kochetkov diving poke check stopped any possible chance right then and there.
Angry over the save, Tkachuk skated over to confront Kochetkov, but the netminder held his ground and returned the chatter and eventually Tkachuk was assessed a misconduct and booted from the game.
"That flying poke check was sweet," Jarvis said. "loved that. He's crazy as you can tell from him jawing at Tkachuk after. Everyone loves that, we love him and he did a great job tonight."
It was a much needed game for the group, the question now is can they continue to build off of this performance?
"You have to build off of that momentum a little bit and hopefully get some good vibes off of it," Brind'Amour said. "We got a bunch of banged up guys right now so that's not good, but let's just take a breath for a night here and then get ready for tomorrow."