Staal joined the "NHL @TheRink" podcast Wednesday to talk about the Hurricanes, his career and his mentors.
"There's no question it was Mark Recchi for me," Staal said. "I got the opportunity to live with him for two years and he helped me so much, stuff I'll never take for granted. Just watching him day to day is the biggest thing, how you approach your everyday and making sure you're able to bring it every night and be as consistent a player as you can throughout 82 games. It's not easy. Watching 'Rex' and how he carried himself as a pro, the way he brought it every night in games, I was always watching and soaking that in."
Staal has been paying it forward with the Hurricanes the past several seasons, the mentor to so many of their young players, including forward Sebastian Aho, who is now 25 and already in his seventh NHL season.
Staal was 24 going into his seventh NHL season, 2012-13, which was his first in Carolina. He said he sees a lot of his younger self in Hurricanes forward Seth Jarvis, who is 20 and in his second season.
"I look at 'Jarv' and I see me in a lot of ways coming in that young and surprising people, really just being the player that he is," Staal said. "There's a bunch of other guys in that room. I enjoy watching this young group and how there are some lethal weapons out there, some pros that are going to be playing for a long time."
Staal also talked about what has made Carolina so good this season, how it won 11 straight games and had points in 17 in a row before losing 5-3 to the New York Rangers on Tuesday.
In addition, Staal looked ahead to the 2023 Navy Federal Credit Union NHL Stadium Series game between the Hurricanes and Washington Capitals, which will be played Feb. 18 at Carter-Finley Stadium, the home football field for N.C. State that is across the parking lot from PNC Arena.
It'll be the Hurricanes first outdoor game. Staal played two with the Penguins, the 2008 Winter Classic in Buffalo and the 2011 Winter Classic in Pittsburgh.
"It's going to be a blast," Staal said. "I watched a little bit of the Winter Classic. Always a cool event and something I'll always cherish being a part of them. To do it down here in Raleigh is going to be really cool. Our fans are crazy, I give them that, and we're going to get 60,000 of them together, it's going to be a fun party and a good time against a good team."
Co-hosts Dan Rosen and Shawn P. Roarke opened the episode talking about their experiences at the 2023 Discover NHL Winter Classic won by the Boston Bruins 2-1 against the Pittsburgh Penguins at Fenway Park on Monday. They also discussed the Hurricanes, venues they'd like to see host an NHL outdoor game and the Buffalo Sabres and Los Angeles Kings before closing the show.
The podcast is free, and listeners can subscribe on all podcast platforms. It is also available on
NHL.com/multimedia/podcasts
and the NHL app.
---
Listen: New episode of NHL @TheRink
