The days of Eric Staal seem to be long gone, along with the fortuitous times he brought the Carolina Hurricanes organization. Superstars are a popular breed in the NHL as almost every NHL franchise has a quality player to back their team behind, but for the Hurricanes, things haven’t always been so simple.
Eric Staal, Cam Ward, and Ron Francis are the names that come to mind when Hurricanes’ greats are being talked about, but Francis is probably the biggest name around the NHL the Canes have ever had the fortune of holding.
Enter the modern day and the team hasn’t had a player that has even come close to any of these guys. Eric Staal wasn’t even that good at the tail end of his Hurricanes’ career and that was over five years ago. Francis left the Hurricanes in 2004. It has been quite some time since the Triangle area saw any true superstar.
A bonafide star brings a lot to a town, notoriety and ticket sales being the biggest two factors. Having a player that the city identifies with is important and it culminates to a better sense of community among the fans. Carolina has not been able to get a grip on someone like this in recent memory, but that is all about to change.
Since he was drafted in 2015, forward Sebastian Aho has been slowly transforming into Carolina’s next big player. The 20-year-old Finnish born youngster has been tearing up the ice and deserves some praise. He has been gaining a lot of popularity in the last year and his performance so far this season has backed up the hype.
He has 40 points in the 2017 season with 19 goals and 21 assists. He has additionally logged 10 powerplay points and three game-winning goals, scoring eight goals and earning 10 points in his last 10 contests.
The 2015 draft class that produced Aho is a class of itself to begin with, giving us players like Connor McDavid, Jack Eichel, Brock Boeser, and Zach Werenski. McDavid and Eichel have taken the league by storm, with McDavid already certifying himself as the Oilers’ future.
Since 2015, Aho ranks third in goals (43), fourth in points (89), sixth in power-play points (27), and seventh in games played (131) among his fellow draftees. In terms of goals, only McDavid and Eichel lead Aho, with the two scoring 68 and 63 goals, respectively. They are prolific scorers so it makes sense how far ahead they are. Aho is only five assists away from having the fifth most and only five points away from fourth most power-play points among his draft class.
Defenseman Noah Hanifin was selected to the All-Star game from the Hurricanes this season, but I think Aho is on his way there and more. He has headed the surge of Finnish talent on the team and his offensive prowess is becoming more frightening for defenses every game. He is the future of this franchise and you can expect him to catch Jeff Skinner in goals in the next 10 years. I predict that Aho will finish the season with more than 40 goals and over 100 points.