NHL Games to Watch this Weekend: Keep your eyes on the Rangers

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↵Carolina @ New Jersey: You’ve got to hand it to the Carolina Hurricanes franchise. While they may not make it to the postseason very often, they do have a knack for making those visits count, getting to the Finals in 2002 and 2006, winning it all in the latter case.
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↵This season, they swapped out the coach who led them to a Cup (Peter Laviolette) for the guy who originally got them to the Finals in the first place (Paul Maurice), and it’s been hard to argue with the results of late.
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↵Winners of five straight, the Hurricanes have stormed (pun intended) back into the playoff race and now stand only one point behind Philadelphia for the fourth seed in the East and home ice in the first round.
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↵Carolina still plays that sort of firewagon hockey that won them the Cup in 2006, a style that’s been nicely supplemented by the re-importation of Erik Cole from Edmonton at the deadline. Toss in Cam Ward, and this is the team nobody in the East wants to meet in the first round. ↵

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↵Columbus @ St. Louis: That giant gasp you heard around the NHL Thursday night was the rest of the league coming to the realization that the Columbus Blue Jackets are not only going to make the playoffs for the first time, but that when they get there, they’re going to present a heck of a threat.
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↵What other conclusion could you come to after seeing the once-derided Jackets crush Northwest-leading Calgary, 5-0? Sure, the team has got Ken Hitchcock’s defense-first thing down, but what teams really need to worry about is the fact that they’ve got a top-flight goalie to go with it.
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↵Rookie goalie Steve Mason now has 10 shutouts, and will get serious Vezina consideration to go along with the Calder Trophy that might as well already have his name on it. If the season ended Friday, they’d meet Calgary in the first round, a prospect I’m sure has Flames head coach Mike Keenan awake deep into the night. ↵

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↵Sunday ↵

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↵Nashville @ Detroit: When your depth is a thin as it is in Nashville, losing a player like Jason Arnott during the stretch drive to the playoffs is something of a problem. With Arnott out of the lineup since March 10 after suffering a concussion, the Predators are still scrapping, going 3-1-3 without their captain and holding onto the last playoff spot in the West by a single point.
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↵That grit was never on better display than Thursday night, when the team roared back from two goals down in a little less than three minutes to defeat Pacific-leading San Jose, 3-2.
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↵If they do make the playoffs, they’d be given little chance against probable opponents like the Sharks and Red Wings, but still have enough punch to make such a series turn into a costly victory. ↵

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