The biggest move the Carolina Hurricanes made ahead of the NHL’s 3 p.m. trade deadline Monday turned out to be one they didn’t make. Aside from acquiring minor league forward Tomas Jurco from the Florida Panthers for future considerations and sending Cliff Pu the other way for the same return, the Canes did not make a deal.

The Canes held on to pending unrestricted free agent forward Micheal Ferland, and kept a group that has gone an NHL-best 17-6-1 and jumped into the final Wild Card spot in the Eastern Conference’s final Wild Card spot together.

“We really felt it was important, any players that we were talking about, either acquiring or deleting, how that was going to fit in the locker room,” general manager Don Waddell said. “We went into the day liking our team, and we’re going to end today liking our team just as much because of what these guys have been through and what they’ve accomplished so far.”

The biggest decision was for the Canes was what to do with Ferland. The rugged winger has been a great fit with Carolina since coming over in a blockbuster deal with Calgary in the offseason. Ferland has brought a needed element to the lineup, a physical forward who can score; he’s put up 16 goals and 33 points in 53 games.

Those elements make Ferland a valuable player, and soon to be an expensive one. The Canes are unlikely to match what he could get on the open market, making him a logical trade target for playoff contenders. The Canes, however; have become just that, and Waddell opted to hold on to Ferland as a vote of confidence in his group for the 20-game stretch run.

“We had lots of conversations right up to the deadline,” Waddell said. “We said to everybody involved that Micheal is a very important part of our hockey club. He’s done a good job for us. … So we told teams all along that if there’s a deal that we couldn’t say no to, we would talk and look at it but at the end of the day there was nothing that made sense for us to trade Micheal Ferland.”

So, if the Canes are gearing up for a playoff run, why not add to the group? Waddell looked at doing that, at rentals, players with term, hockey trades and trading futures for additional players.

But, at the end of the day, there wasn’t a deal that made sense, and Waddell opted to stick to a group that just got forward Jordan Staal back from a lengthy injury, and has put the team in a great spot to reach the postseason in Rod Brind’Amour’s first season as head coach.

“Whenever you’re talking about adding pieces, you want to make sure those pieces can fit in that locker room, but also that any pieces you’re taking out of the locker room, how it’s going to affect the guys,” Waddell said. “We believe in this team; that’s why we’ve stuck with them and we’re going to move forward like this.”

That’s not to say the Canes haven’t made any big moves this season. Part of the reason Waddell didn’t need to make a move Monday is that he already committed highway robbery in January by dealing struggling center Victor Rask to the Minnesota Wild for winger Nino Niederreiter.

Niederreiter has been an instant fit with the Canes on the top line with forwards Sebastian Aho and Justin Williams, adding nine goals and 15 points in 16 games.

“That was our big trade,” Waddell said. “When you make that trade, nobody knows how it’s going to work out. … He’s produced. If that didn’t go as well, we might be talking different here today. We might be still looking for that scoring. But we believe that we can score enough goals now to win games.”

The Hurricanes now head into the season’s final 20 games controlling their own destiny when it comes to ending the league’s longest-active playoff drought, one that stretches back to 2009. Carolina currently holds the final Wild Card spot in the East with 72 points in 62 games via tiebreaker; the Canes have one more regulation/overtime win than the Pittsburgh Penguins.

The Canes are also a point back of the Montreal Canadiens for the first Wild Card and the Columbus Blue Jackets for the third spot in the Metropolitan Division. The team will head into the last 20 games looking to continue on the torrid run that has put it in such a good position, with the confidence of its general manager behind it.

“We’ve been on a roll here since January 1,” Waddell said. “You look at the last 12-13 games how well we’ve played, some very, very tough games and tough situations, how we’ve responded. These guys, it’s a great group of guys in the locker room. I’ve been around a lot of teams over the years. This group really, they’ve come together, the culture that’s created in that locker room, obviously when you have a guy leading like Justin Williams it becomes a lot easier.”

“I think every year you’ve got to look at what your situation is. It’s not like we limped into the deadline here. We’ve got in with a lot of wins in the last two months. We’ve got to run it through the last 20 games and head into the playoffs.”