There’s now plenty of material ready for a B-level Disney movie called The Rod Brind’Amour Story, available to anyone who wants to put a quick script together. A man comes back to the franchise he won a title with as a player and, through some difficulty and with a lot of perseverance, managed to do the same as head coach.
Actually, when I put it that way it’s way too cornball; nobody’s gonna buy that.
It’s amazing how much has changed for the Hurricanes in 20 years, since that last championship, to
now—that 2006 team was very good but also didn’t necessarily feel like it had long-term staying power. The franchise was a lot more inconsistent back then.
The dominant run that the 2026 Hurricanes finished off on Sunday was the culmination of an incredible run of success under Brind’Amour that’s seen a playoff run become an expectation. Eight straight years of playoff berths with several trips to at least the Eastern Conference Finals in there is a hell of a stretch for any franchise, and coming as it does on the back end of all that, this championship feels different.
We’ve been having a lot of fun watching a good hockey team for a long time now—which is tougher to appreciate amid disappointing Eastern Conference Finals meltdowns, but is more than clear after the breakthrough. These last eight years have been great, the team has become an even bigger part of Raleigh’s culture, and this weekend they concluded a 16-3 run through the playoffs in which they wore down every opponent emotionally and physically. It’s wild to be saying or experiencing anything like this about a professional sports franchise in Raleigh, North Carolina.
I’m sure this will sink in eventually.
