Can Pyotr Kochetkov Establish Himself As The Hurricanes Number One Netminder?

Fire and ice

Yin and yang.

Night and day.

Opposites exist all throughout our universe and most of the time, they work to balance each other out.

For the Carolina Hurricanes that opposite balance exists in net with their two starting netminders.

Frederik Andersen is the calm and collected veteran. He's an experienced netminder whose emotional state never seems to waiver no matter the circumstance.

Then there is Pyotr Kochetkov, the fiery young Russian whose aggressive style and high-energy, emotion-filled play can swing the momentum of any game.

"His competitiveness... that's a real strength," said Hurricanes coach Rod Brind'Amour. "I think he goes by feel a lot. If I'm just watching, it's kind of throwback a little bit to some of the old goalies. You couldn't really pinpoint how they made the saves, but they just figured it out."

Both have their place on the Hurricanes and both will be equally relied upon this season, but should that be the case?

"We've always kind of shared the workload and that's really served us well," Brind'Amour said. "We have two good ones, but it's all up for grabs."

Andersen is 35 and along with his contract expiring after this year, he's been a very injury-prone goaltender as of late (including now where it's been announced that he's dealing with something although it isn't expected to be a long-term thing).

Related: Hurricanes Goaltender Frederik Andersen Dealing With Injury

Kochetkov on the other hand is a young, up-and-coming netminder who handled the workload of a starter last year when Andersen went down and put up really promising results.

Last season, Kochetkov started 40 games for the Hurricanes and posted a 23-13-4 record with a 0.911 save percentage which earned him a fourth place finish in Calder Trophy voting.

He's also signed for three additional years after this one and the Canes need to make sure he can be the guy moving forward.

"I hope," Kochetkov told The Hockey News when asked if he thinks he's ready to be a starter. "But I have a lot of respect for Freddie. I just want the team to have a chance to win every night. Whoever is better for today is who we play. For me now, I want to be. I know it's very selfish so I want to be a team guy. Whoever's better for the team today is the guy who plays."

This year is a big change for Kochetkov too where he is decidedly one of the team's main roster goalies as opposed to the last two seasons where he started in the AHL.

"It is a great experience because I no go to AHL before season," Kochetkov said. "It is my first season where I didn't go to the AHL to start so this year will be a good challenge. I had a good summer. I did a lot of work and I hope that I'm ready, but we'll see."

The Russian netminder plays with such a passion and fire and you can clearly see it in action on the ice.

His diving poke checks or penchant to join in on a scrum not only endears itself to the fans, but his teammates too who can ride that wave of emotion.

So far however, as the two netminders have alternated starts, Andersen has decidedly had the edge as he leads the league in both save percentage (0.941) and goals against average (1.48).

Kochetkov played two good games against the New Jersey Devils and Calgary Flames, but his dud against the St. Louis Blues has hurt his early season stats.

But to be fair, it also took Kochetkov a few games last year before he really found his stride.

A lot of people were down on Carolina heading into this season due to all of the departures they had, but so far the team looks solid and a big part of that is the continued high-level play of their netminders.

"The group's a little bit changed," Kochetkov said. "We have lots of new guys. For me, it's tough to say. You need a little bit of luck, good work. I don't want to think about the playoffs now. We just need to win games and have a good season. The NHL is very hard every night. Every game. Coach told us before the season, we can't win the Cup now. It's just step by step."

Nobody can say if Kochetkov will or won't solidify himself as the Hurricanes' go-to guy this season. All he can do is just take each start game-by-game.

But if he can continue to play at a high-level, giving his team a chance to win every night like he has so often in his young career, then I'm confident that the young Russian's name will be up there with the rest of his outstanding countrymen.

And what better opportunity than now to make that stamp?