{"id":554181,"date":"2026-04-17T00:12:16","date_gmt":"2026-04-17T00:12:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/554181\/"},"modified":"2026-04-17T00:12:16","modified_gmt":"2026-04-17T00:12:16","slug":"ehlers-good-fit-with-hurricanes-entering-playoffs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/554181\/","title":{"rendered":"Ehlers good fit with Hurricanes entering playoffs"},"content":{"rendered":"

CHICAGO — For Nikolaj Ehlers<\/a>,\u00a0it\u2019s been a season of adjusting to a lot of new: new team, new location, new climate, new rink, new system, new living arrangements.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a lot of small things, but when it\u2019s all new, it\u2019s a lot of stuff that you have to figure out,\u201d said the forward, who signed a six-year, $51 million contract ($8.5 million average annual value) with the Carolina Hurricanes on July 3 after spending his first 10 NHL seasons with the Winnipeg Jets. \u201cIt\u2019s what I wanted, so there are no excuses, but I knew it was going to take some time to get comfortable.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been getting more and more comfortable. I know the ways to the rink now and things like that. It\u2019s still going to take time. I\u2019m not 100 percent there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Perhaps, but on the ice, the 30-year-old has looked right at home. Ehlers had a career-high 71 points (26 goals, 45 assists) in 82 games this season, finishing second on the Hurricanes behind center Sebastian Aho<\/a>\u00a0(80 points; 27 goals, 53 assists). He\u2019s brought the extra pop the Hurricanes (53-22-7) needed to finish first in the Metropolitan Division and the Eastern Conference.<\/p>\n

Now he\u2019s looking to help them make a splash in the Stanley Cup Playoffs, where Carolina will host the Ottawa Senators in Game 1 of the best-of-7 Eastern Conference First Round at Lenovo Center on Saturday (3 pm. ET; ESPN, SN, TVAS).\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI think whenever you can add experience and playoff experience, they know how important the games are, how important every play is,\u201d Hurricanes forward Jordan Martinook<\/a>\u00a0said. \u201cThat\u2019s just another guy to have in our back pocket when the games are really important and meaningful and when all the plays matter so much more.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ehlers and the Hurricanes are both looking to reach the playoff pinnacle. Ehlers advanced to the Western Conference Final with the Jets in 2018, but Winnipeg hasn\u2019t gotten past the second round since. The Hurricanes have qualified for the playoffs eight straight seasons, advancing to the Eastern Conference Final three times (2019, 2023 and last season). Carolina won the only Stanley Cup championship in its history in 2006.<\/p>\n

\u201cI mean, this is what you work for all year, and these guys have been in the playoffs for the last eight, nine years and done well,\u201d Ehlers said. \u201cI\u2019m excited to get it going, to play the games at home and just go to battle and hopefully make it far.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CHICAGO — For Nikolaj Ehlers,\u00a0it\u2019s been a season of adjusting to a lot of new: new team, new…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":554182,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5107],"tags":[194,29,5176,5,195,4],"class_list":{"0":"post-554181","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-carolina-hurricanes","8":"tag-carolina","9":"tag-carolina-hurricanes","10":"tag-carolinahurricanes","11":"tag-hockey","12":"tag-hurricanes","13":"tag-nhl"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116417157134596946","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/554181","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=554181"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/554181\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/554182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=554181"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=554181"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=554181"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}