Though disappointed to miss significant time due to injury and then miss the playoffs for the second time in as many seasons, the third-year center really hit his stride down the stretch, scoring 15 points in his last 17 games. Contrast that with 10 points scored in his first 28 games and it’s easy to see why he’ll enter the offseason with confidence.
“I’ve always believed in my offensive ability,” said Sutter, whose first flash of doing so at the pro level came with a breakout five points in five games during the 2013 playoffs. “I think I took a big step this year and set career highs in pretty much everything as far as points per game and that kind of stuff. I’ve got to take another step next year.”
Immediately after his sophomore season one year ago, Sutter, now 23, spoke of feeling more comfortable as a pro following his first full AHL season and set a goal of putting himself in the mix for his first shot at the NHL. As it turned out, he achieved that quite early, completing a four-game stint with Carolina in October that included a debut at Madison Square Garden and two contests in his home province of Alberta.
Unfortunately for Sutter, the lower-body injury suffered shortly after his return to Charlotte halted that momentum. He would end up missing almost exactly two months.
“It was a tough nine weeks,” he said. “It sucks being hurt. Anytime you’re hurt and the team is not having much success, it just makes everything drag out and the days are longer. It wasn’t a lot of fun watching a lot of nights but it is what it is.”
After taking some time to re-adjust to the speed of the game – no small feat in the second half of the season with teams entering their playoff pushes – Sutter began to catch fire in March. After posting a few two-assist games earlier in the month, he scored a blistering seven points during a four-game streak near the end, including his first three-point game as a pro and his first two multi-goal games since that aforementioned playoff performance against Oklahoma City.
Jeff Daniels, his coach in Charlotte until the end of last season, said that Sutter’s late-season scoring surge didn’t come from doing anything crazy aside from using his 6-foot-5 frame to his advantage in reaching the more hotly-contested areas of the ice.
“If you look at it, all those goals came from right on top of the crease,” said Daniels, who looks for Sutter to hit the 20-goal range in the near future. “It wasn’t like he was picking the puck up and beating four or five guys. He was just keeping it simple and driving the net.
“That’s going to have to be his game. Hopefully he has confidence in the (offensive) part but also he’s got to remember how he’s going to get to the next level.”
As he looks to add power and another step of quickness through his offseason training, Sutter, a restricted free agent for the first time, said that he was also hoping to develop into more of a leader on a team that could potentially be quite young once again depending on what the Hurricanes to with their own free agents and the possible signing of new ones.
Other than that, with a few NHL games now under his belt, he hopes to pick up where he left off from that strong finish to an otherwise trying season.
“I think I’ve improved all three years,” he said. “I’m happy with my progress as a player and hopefully they (the Hurricanes) are too. It’s a nice feather in your cap when they give you that chance and they believe in you, but I want to take that to the next level and be a guy that they believe in full time.”
