If I had said that the only way we could beat the Blackhawks on Friday night was the lose to the St. Louis Blues on Sunday night, would you take it as a Canucks fan? What if I said we could shut the Hawks out? If you aren't screaming "Heck yes" in response, you just don't get the nature of the 'Nucks/Hawks rivalry. When I think about the situation that way, the 2-3 loss to the Blues last night doesn't hurt so bad. At least we beat the Blackhawks.
Did someone on the Canucks forget the memo in the third period. In the first, the Blues scored, then we scored. In the second, the Blues scored, then we scored. And in the third? The Blues scored at 6:11, and we had no answer. Former Maple Leaf, and thus hated, Alex Steen got the game opening goal and the game winning goal for St. Louis, not to mention an assist as well. In the third, Steen showed pure hustle to beat the Canucks defenders to a loose puck, fought off a stick check, and lifted a backhander past Luongo. Then the Blues closed up shop. The Orca managed just 2 shots in the first 16 minutes of the third period. They put 5 on Halak as the game ran out, but you can't let a team dominate you like that when you're behind in the final frame.
Props to Jannik Hansen, though, as he answered the call, as Mason "Flu Like Symptoms" Raymond was a scratch on the second line. The Great Dane batted home a loose puck after a Keith Ballard blast bounced through traffic. The Blues second goal came off of a misdirection from a Vancouver stick. The first was on a rebound. And the third, ugh. Luongo really didn't have much of a chance on any of them. Kevin Bieksa's goal came just after a man advantage expired, as we went 0 for 5, when his top of the circle shot went 5 hole on Ryan Kesler and the goalie he was screening. It wouldn't be enough, though.
The top 3 stars, as chosen by the "real" media, were Alex Steen (a bit obvious, don't you think?), Jannik Hansen (respect), and Matt D'Agostini (goal, assist, +3). That leaves us with the "LSF Top Star Who Didn't Score A Point," Ryan Kesler. Kes-Lord (hallowed be thy name) put down 11:50 on the ice, putting 4 shots on goal, finished a +1, and had that nice screen on the Bieksa goal. Keep it up, homeboy.
While our winning streak has been stopped, we're still a mighty 14-8-3. Tops in the Northwest, we're 2 points up on Colorado, 5 up on Minnesota, and 7 up on Edmonton and Calgary. How great is it that now both the Oilers and the Flamers are in the division's cellar? So great. We're third in the West, 6 back of the suddenly solid Wings and 2 back of the surprisingly second place Dallas Stars. Meanwhile, the Coyotes and Blackhawks may be 4th and 5th, but they have more points than us. I love that. What that means, though, is that the Canucks are the only Northwest team in the top 8 of the Western Conference right now. Insane.
My boys are +16 in goal differential, sitting 10th in goals scored and 5th in goals against. I guess our defense did get an upgrade. We're ranked 6th in SRS at +0.59, and that shouldn't be surprising given our -0.05 strength of schedule (21st). How about that dropping power play? I know being +7% on the NHL average may sound good, but we all know that signifies a significant drop off for us. Meanwhile, the PK unit is buzzing at about +6% abover average.
This last game has again brought up the frustrating issue of not putting shots on goal when we need to. Why do we not put shots on a guy like Halak when we're trailing late? Why?! Well, I think it's time to expose our shot takers and shot fakers. Who takes the most shots per time on ice, and who fails to pull the trigger? We'll make up a stat of shots per minute on ice (S/MOI), and see what we've got.
Samuelsson: 0.17 S/MOI
Raymond: 0.16 S/MOI
Kesler: 0.15 S/MOI
Daniel: 0.15 S/MOI
Tambellini: 0.15 S/MOI
Burrows: 0.14 S/MOI
Torres: 0.13 S/MOI
Ehrhoff: 0.10 S/MOI
Henrik: 0.10 S/MOI
Edler: 0.09 S/MOI
Bieksa: 0.06 S/MOI
Hamhuis: 0.06 S/MOI
Obviously that's not a complete list, but I feel like it gives a nice idea of who deserves the praise and who needs to be hazed (sorry, sucker for a rhyme). Is it surprising that Mikael Samuelsson is the shot taker extraordinaire of this team? I think, on the other side, it's clear that defenders should be somewhat excused because they generally don't take as many shots as attackers. However, on the offensive side, Henrik Sedin isn't really getting his shot on. I am clear that he plays more of an assisting role, but with what we saw last season (his scoring abilities are there), I'd love to see him put the puck on net more often. Anyone else surprised to see Tambers up there with Kes and DS?Just to add a little more to the shot argument, did you know that Tanner Glass leads the team with a 23.1% S%? He's either really lucky, or really underrated.
On Wednesday, the Canucks go toe to toe with the Ana-slime Formerly Mighty Ducks, and I'm stoked just because of the fact that my boys will be on TV down here in Orange County. The Ducks are 13-13-3, are in the middle of a two game slide (outscored 7-0 by opponents), and the game against Vancouver comes less than 24 hours after the Ducks game against the Oilers. I doubt the Oilers will beat the Ducks, but hopefully they can just tire them out.
Let's attack the quack.
-- Sent from my Palm Prē
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