Barkov scored again with a shot off Shayne Gostisbehere‘s stick at 9:31 to make it 5-1, and Brad Marchand made it 6-1 at 10:37 before Seth Jarvis‘ power-play goal at 11:01.

The final stat sheet was ugly for the Hurricanes.

Rookie defenseman Alexander Nikishin was also minus-4, but that was largely because Orlov was his defense partner, and he got burned by his mistakes. But Hall was minus-4 with two shots on goal and Aho was minus-3 with two shots on goal.

Andrei Svechnikov didn’t have a shot on goal and was credited with three giveaways. Jarvis was minus-2 and his only shot was his window-dressing power-play goal that made it 6-2.

The Hurricanes played with rookies Nikishin and Scott Morrow on the back end, replacing defensemen Sean Walker and Jalen Chatfield, both out with undisclosed injuries. Pyotr Kochetkov started instead of Frederik Andersen. But none of that is why they lost.

“The four rookies in the lineup (Nikishin, Morrow, Stankoven and forward Jackson Blake) can’t be some of your better players,” Brind’Amour said. “Like, that can’t happen. So there’s a couple guys in there that I don’t think came to play the way they needed to at this time of year. It can’t be Jordan Staal and (Jordan) Martinook being our best players. Like, that can’t always be that way, and they are every night. We needed more out of some guys.”

Two years ago, when the Hurricanes were down 3-0 to the Panthers in the Eastern Conference Final, at least they could feel like they were in it, that they were close, that a break here and the series could change because it was that tight with one-goal games and two overtime games.

This isn’t that.

“Yeah, way different,” Brind’Amour said.

With how things have gone for the Hurricanes through three games, with how fragile they look right now, it almost feels cruel that they have to play a Game 4 on Monday.

But they will, and they’re not out of hope yet.

“They’ve got to win four,” Staal said.

One will do for the Hurricanes.