When they moved to the South from New England in 1997, the Hartford Whalers were re-branded as the Carolina Hurricanes, and after an iffy start — spending their first two seasons playing in a half-empty building 90 minutes down the road from Raleigh — they have done very well, winning the Stanley Cup in 2006 while playing in a state-of-the-art arena surrounded by parking lots where pregame tailgating is definitely part of the scene.

On Saturday night prior to their lone home game with the Minnesota Wild this season, some hearty tailgaters braved what was, by North Carolina standards, a cold winter’s night, with clear skies, breezy winds and the temperature hovering around the freezing mark.

The Hurricanes are known for their shoot-first mentality, averaging around 40 shots on goal per game. But it was clear barely five minutes into the first period on Saturday that Minnesota’s visit would be a little different. The Wild killed a four-minute penalty right away after Joel Eriksson Ek was flagged for high sticking, and Minnesota allowed just one shot to get through to Wild goalie Filip Gustavsson on the man-advantage.

“Ekky’s one of the top PK guys, out for four minutes,” Gustavsson recounted in the happy visitors’ locker room. “That’s it. One shot probably. Yeah, I thought we played very good. We blocked a lot of shots there, and PK was very good today.”

The only puck that slipped past Gustavsson on Saturday was a kind of second period fluke, when he made a save but the puck hit Wild defenseman Declan Chisholm in the back and landed over the line. Carolina was offside on the play, and the goal came off the board, on the way to Gustavsson’s third shutout of the season, which required just 20 saves. He admitted expecting to see many more pucks from the Hurricanes.

“Yeah, usually they shoot a lot more here, and they’re getting into your zone with a lot of speed and just shoot a lot,” said the goalie, after improving to 18-6-3 for the season. “It was a fairly quiet night.”

In his most recent shutout prior to the game in Carolina, Gustavsson had stopped all 39 Sabres shots in a 1-0 win at Buffalo on the night before Thanksgiving. In his first clean sheet of the season, Gustavssson stopped just 19 Montreal shots in a Nov. 14 win at home. And while some folks might prefer to let their defensemen block shots before they ever get to the crease, Gustavsson is a goalie that likes to be more engaged.

After eight shots in the opening period, and nine in the middle frame, Carolina tested Gustavsson just three times in the final 20 minutes.

“I don’t like that,” Gustavsson said. “I’d rather work a lot. It was kind of cold in the third period.”

On what passes for a chilly night on Tobacco Road, facing a team named after bad weather, when the Minnesota defenders are on their game, having a frigid crease is just a hazard of life on the road for the Wild.

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