John E. Sokolowski-USA TODAY Sports

The Carolina Hurricanes will go into Thursday night’s game against the Ottawa Senators off a 4-1 win on Monday night and during a shortened season, any two full days off have to be great. Carolina has struggled to a 4-4 start this year and now goes north to Ottawa to face a team that is sitting at 6-3-1 for the year. There was the positive of Eric and Jordan Staal both scoring in the same game last time out, and that must keep happening.

Jordan Staal was brought over to team up with his brother, but didn’t score his first goal of the season until Monday night. Staal must get his goal scoring up if the Hurricanes want to do any damage. Eric Staal on the other hand, is red hot right now, with a six-game points streak and has seven goals in eight games this season.

I really hope he has gotten into his brother’s ear about how ineffective he has been so far this year putting the puck in the net. It hasn’t helped the team though that goalie Cam Ward has been struggling and is giving up over three goals a game. I wouldn’t be surprised if Dan Ellis is in net for Thursday’s game against the Senators.

This is a very important game for the Hurricanes, with the team being just four points out of first place in the Southeast Division. The Staals are putting up points in bunches even if it is Eric scoring goals and Jordan making all the assists. This team appears to be getting better by the day, and just need the Staal brothers to keep up what they have done so far.

Andy Schmidt is a columnist/writer for RantSports. Follow him on Twitter @ASchmidtSports, like his Facebook page or add him to your network on Google.