-Gabriel Dorris-

The Canes offseason isn’t done. Martin Necas and Jack Drury still haven’t been signed or traded and Seth Jarvis has not yet met an agreement with the team on an extension. Still, one thing has become abundantly clear; no matter what moves new GM Eric Tulsky makes before the end of summer, the team that takes the ice on opening night in the Canes 2024-25 season will not hold the same level of talent as the team that we watched lose a 6-game second round series to the New York Rangers just a few months ago.

This begs the question; what is the gameplan?

Intentional down year?

This season, the Canes will almost certainly make the playoffs.

I find them incredibly unlikely to do much more (of course, I’d loved to be surprised)

But this isn’t a surprise, or an indictment of Tulsky’s performance in his first offseason as general manager. In fact, this year has been planned for a while. The Canes have for years now been signing or acquiring contracts scheduled to end in the 2024 offseason, with the goal of replacing said contracts with value placeholders and rookies.

But that still doesn’t answer the main question; why this was the plan.

2025-2026

Nobody wants to watch their team get significantly worse over the course of an offseason, as we have with the Canes this year. However, this is a set-up which will allow the Canes to build their strongest core yet going into the 2025-26 season-

Seth Jarvis, Jack Drury, Andrei Svechnikov, and (arguably most importantly) Pyotr Kochetkov will all be entering their primes. In the case of the latter two, they’re already locked into affordable deals for this season.

Some mix of Alexander Nikishin, Scott Morrow, Bradly Nadeau, Felix Ugner-Sorum, and Jackson Blake will be entering the league.

Dmitry Orlov’s $7.75m AAV contract will be expiring

Brent Burns’ $5.28m AAV contract will be expiring

Evgeny Kuznetsov’s $3.9m AAV contract will be expiring

At this point, a verdict will have been made on Jesperi Kotkaniemi. He will either be a solid player, traded, or bought out.

The result?

The Canes will have this lineup with $29m in cap to fill out three spots

Get a fourth liner and a backup goalie for $2m each, and you’ve got over $24m in cap to fill out two spots.

Of course, this is contingent on a lot of things going right. The rookies have to prove themselves capable of an NHL role. Kochetkov has to prove himself capable to be the Canes long term starter.

But still; the gameplan is clear.