Rod Brind'Amour's bold warning explains why Hurricanes players refused to touch the trophy
Rod Brind'Amour set the tone Friday, and the Hurricanes head coach made sure nobody touched the Prince of Wales Trophy.
When Carolina wrapped up the Eastern Conference title for the 2025-26 season, the group gathered for the presentation but kept its distance from the trophy.
Bill Daly handed it over, and the picture said everything.
That scene looked like classic hockey superstition.
Players around the league have long treated conference trophies like bad luck when the real target is still sitting four wins away.
Brind'Amour was asked after the game whether he had pushed the room in that direction. His first answer was simple:
Then he let the punchline land. Brind'Amour admitted some players asked what he thought, and his message was clear:
That line cracked up the media, but it also sounded like a coach who knows exactly how these moments live inside a locker room.
Carolina may laugh about it, but nobody inside that room wants to tempt anything right now.
Brind'Amour leaned on a memory Carolina knows well
This wasn't random.
The Hurricanes have lived both sides of this story, and Brind'Amour has seen it up close as a player and now as the man behind the bench.
Back in 2002, Carolina won the East and Ron Francis lifted the trophy.
The run ended one round later when the Red Wings shut the door in the Stanley Cup Final.
Four years later, the script changed. In 2006, Brind'Amour and the Hurricanes left the trophy alone, then finished the job against the Oilers in a 7-game Final.
That history matters in Carolina because it ties emotion to outcome.
Players hear those stories, coaches remember them, and habits like this stick when a franchise has seen both endings.
Brind'Amour's answer landed because it felt half joke, half warning. That's usually how hockey rooms handle pressure this late in the spring.
The bigger point is that Carolina isn't celebrating a conference banner like it's the finish line.
The Hurricanes posed for the photo, kept their hands off the silver, and moved on.
Now the superstition gets its next test. Carolina followed Brind'Amour's old rule, and inside that room they're betting the same path can bring the same ending.
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YESTERDAY
MAY 29, 2026
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| G | A | PTS | ||
| Taylor Hall | 1 | 2 | 3 | |
| Logan Stankoven | 1 | 2 | 3 | |
| Jackson Blake | 1 | 1 | 2 | |
| Seth Jarvis | 1 | 1 | 2 | |
| Cole Caufield | 1 | - | 1 | |
| Shayne Gostisbehere | 1 | - | 1 | |
| Eric Robinson | 1 | - | 1 | |
| Sebastian Aho | - | 1 | 1 | |
| William Carrier | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Nikolaj Ehlers | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Lane Hutson | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Alexander Nikishin | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Andrei Svechnikov | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Frederik Andersen | - | - | - | |
| Josh Anderson | - | - | - | |
| Zachary Bolduc | - | - | - | |
| Alexandre Carrier | - | - | - | |
| Jalen Chatfield | - | - | - | |
| Kirby Dach | - | - | - | |
| Phillip Danault | - | - | - | |
| COMPLETE STATS | ||||