Things are heating up in British Columbia. After getting off to their usual slow start, the Canucks appear to be unbeatable as of late, beating Detroit 6-4 over the weekend to increase the winning streak to an impressive six games. On a night where defensive failed to take center stage, one Canuck center rose to the top to save the day. That center? The Magnificent Manny Malhotra, who with his partners on the third line, carried the Canucks to an impressive victory against the NHL's Red Devils.
The games against the Red Wings are always highly anticipated around Orca Nation, as Detroit seems to provide a measuring stick of sorts for teams seeking the Western Conference Crown. Of course, we get even more fired up, knowing that Detroit coming to town also signals the return of Todd Bertuzzi to the greater Vancouver area.
This battle may have been a goal fest, with 10 in all, but the first period certainly didn't start out that way. It took 19:35 for the first goal to be tallied, but a couple players got me excited long before that Daniel Sedin one timer tickled the twine. Andrew Alberts is a blue liner who has been bringing the pain as of late, and his huge hits in the opening frame got me out of my seat. NHL First Star of the Week, Raffi Torres, also saw a lot of battles along the boards, showcasing the reason we signed him: grit (and for loads of goals, as it turns out). Raffi was speeding into the boards, battling for pucks, and making us all proud. As the period came to a close, Alex Edler passed to Daniel Sedin as the Canucks raced into the zone. Daniel tried to hit Edler on the one timer, but the puck went to the rear boards. Edler quickly fed Hank behind the net as he got smashed, Hank immediately fed Daniel along the goal line, and Daniel sent the puck home. Love scoring early and late, eh?
Of course, by looking at the final score, you know that Detroit came back. It started 2:51 into the second, when Keith Ballard fell down at the blue line, allowing Abdelkader to skate in alone. He threw a puck high at a goal crashing Danny Cleary, and Cleary allowed the puck to bounce off his glove and into the net. Now, he may not have moved his hand toward the goal to cause the deflection, but his hockey stop into the goal with his glove perfectly positioned for the deflection was a little suspect. The refs didn't agree. 1:30ish later, the Red Wings got a favorable bounce again. Holmstrom sent a puck in from deep, the puck bounced wildly far back to Kronwall in front of the net, and the Red Wings forward buried it before Luongo knew what happened. Why are our boards giving the bad guys good bounces? Just about a minute later, though, we'd strike back. Ryan Kesler created a turnover in the offensive zone, and fed Tanner Glass. Glass sent a blisering shot in that Mikael Samuelsson deflected for a game tying goal. With about 2 minutes remaining, and after Jannik Hansen was stuffed on a short handed breakaway, it was time for Manny Malhotra to take over. Manny straight up jacked a puck at the blue line, and skated all alone in on goal, converting the shortie to take the lead. Man, breakaways are exciting. About 60 seconds later, though, the Wings would tie it up again, scoring a power play goal on a one timer from the blue line.
Early in the third, Kevin Bieksa failed to clear a puck beyond center ice, and the Wings showed a nice transition game, as Kronwell scored again, this time on a deep wrister as he sped into the zone. But, enough was enough, and the Orca responded. With nearly 4 minutes gone, Malhotra sent a perfect pass to Jannik Hansen, the Great Dane standing right in front of the net. He converted to tie it at 4. On the power play with just under 12 to go in the game, Daniel and Henrik were pulling off some amazing passing, even using the boards for long hook ups. Interestingly, a failed pass to Ryan Kesler in the slot found it's way to Alex Edler, and he bombed a slapper for his first of the year and for the lead in the game. With 11:02 gone by in the third, Manny Malhotra would ice it. Mason Raymond faked a pass that fooled everyone, and then sent his pass to Malhotra in front, who crushed it home to secure the win. It was Manny's second of the game, his fourth of the year, and just another big Vannie victory.
The Canucks dominated in shots (34-28), dominated in faceoffs (37-24), and dominated in hits (28-18). Of course, we weren't perfect, as another too many men on the ice penalty shows. But, we seemed to beat the Wings in every aspect of the game, and that felt good. The "real" media's three stars were Ryan Kesler (2 assists), Manny Malhotra (2 goals, 1 assist), and Nick Kronwall (2 goals, +2). While we held former Canuck Todd Bertuzzi to zero points, he is not the "LSF Top Star Without A Point." That honor belongs to Andrew Alberts. Are you kidding me? AA is playing like a man possessed, including his insane hit on Pavel Datsyuk and his post game comment of, "I don't think he saw me coming." Alberts play definitely raises questions about who will be the top 6 on the blue line when Dan Hamhuis returns. Will Ballard or Bieksa's poor play from last night come back to haunt them?
At 8-3-2, the Canucks continue to lead the Northwest Division outright. In our rear view mirror, we see Minnesota (-2), Colorado (-3), Calgary (-6), and Edmonton (-8). Overall in the West, we're sitting in third place, trailing St. Louis and Los Angeles (20 points each). And don't you worry about the LSF NHL standings, because we're currently crushing there as well. The 'Nucks now have a +8 goal differential, ranked 9th in goals scored and 6th in goals against (out of 30 NHL teams). Our Strength of Schedule rating has climbed to +0.12 (the 7th most difficult schedule in the league), which has helped boost our SRS to +0.74 (good enough for 5th in the NHL). Our power play percentage continues to be awesome (over +12% of NHL average) and our penalty kill is now just +3% on the average NHL mark.
Thanks to his impressive game over the weekend, Manny Malhotra gets our spotlight today. We've already shown how Raffi Torres was an impressive under the radar addition this season, and now Malhotra is showing he's just as impressive (and underrated). In terms of points, Daniel and Henrik lead the team with 16 each, and then Malhotra and Alex Eder sit in second with 10 a piece. His four goals ranks fourth on the team, behind Daniel (9), Raffi (7), and Ryan Kesler (5). His 6 assists also tie him for fourth on the team with Mikael Samuelsson, and he is tied for the +/- lead on the team with Jannik Hansen at +5.
All of this, and we haven't even mentioned that he leads the NHL in faceoff percentage. And this from our third line center? The guy who is supposed to pilot the line that just tries to keep the score where it was when the Twins stepped off the ice? The Mississauga, Ontario native has been quite the pleasant surprise. I mean, I was stoked when he came aboard, but I didn't expect these results.
He's doing all of this with just a 16:23 ATOI (average time on ice), and that makes it all the more impressive. Right now, he's responsible for creating 0.29 goals per game, and his "Adjusted Stats" per Hockey Reference shows us that he's playing at a potential 27 goal (66 point) pace. Again, realize that he's a third line center. Great stuff.
Next up for the red hot Canucks is a road battle with Montreal (8-5-1). With 17 points, they lead their division and sit #3 in the East (-3 on the Caps and Flyers), and are kind of off to a hot start. However, this month they are 1-2, most recently losing 2-3 to Ottawa, and only beating a subpar Buffalo team this month by an opposite 3-2 tally. Kostitsyn and Plekanec are pretty studly, but hopefully their studliness ends tomorrow night with the Orca coming to town.
Vers le bas avec les Habs!
-- Sent from my Palm Prē
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