Maybe I should just start hating the entire Central Division. I mean, the rivalry between the Canucks and Blackhawks has been well documented. Now, the St. Louis Blues somehow know how to beat the 'Nucks consistently, and the hate is growing there as well. But, when I look at the Central Division and see the Hawks, the Blues, the Wings, the Preds, and the Blue Jackets, I don't really see a team worth liking (maybe a case can be made for Columbus). The whole division is complete garbage. Today's frustrated rant, though, will focus on those sneaky Blue Notes.
Heading into the battle with the Blues last night, I was really excited. The last team to beat Roberto Luongo in regulation, way back on December 5, was St. Louis. As I typed yesterday, Bobby Lu had gone 16-0-5 since that loss. This game against the Blues, to me at least, was an exciting chance to get some revenge and continue that streak. It didn't end up that way. The Blues scored on two of their five man advantages, and scored another one on a huge mistake from Roberto Luongo. Bobby Lu tried to clear a puck when he was way out from the net, his pass was short, and Alex Steen stole the puck and blasted it in. Our goals from Hank Sedin (with some nice help from the slightly injured Alex Burrows) and Jannik Hansen weren't enough, as we lost 2-3. The game was a great example of how the injuries to our blue line may be catching up to us, especially on the penalty kill.
The Canucks got called on 5 penalties last night, while the Blues got called just once? Home ice advantage, much? We all know that the true backbone of a team's penalty kill unit is their defenders, and with every blue liner and his mother going down for the Orca as of late, our penalty kill units are feeling the brunt. Right now, with Hamhuis, Edler, and Ballard all out (yeah, that's half of our top six forwards), we are grasping at straws. We rolled with Bieksa, Ehrhoff, Salo (who played less than 14 minutes), Tanev (who played less than 13 minutes), Alberts (who played less than 10 minutes), and Rome. Bieksa, Ehrhoff, and Romey combined for over 65 minutes of ice time, and when you look at that ice time all over again, you see that Kevin Bieksa and Christian Ehrhoff shouldered way more of the load than they can possibly handle.
How can Mr. Preseason Trade Rumors and Ehrhoff take over the entire defensive load? They're trying, but they can't, and that showed up on the penalty kill last night. And we're not talking about a good power play team taking it to a weakened penalty kill on this one. The St. Louis Blues have a 15.23 PP%. Compared to the league average of 18.07%, you can easily see how bad they actually are. If you compare them to the class of the league, us at 24.88%, you see even more how unsuccessful the Blues have been on the advantage. And yet, they scored 2 out of 5 times on the Vannies when the refs handed them a power play chance.
So, what are we going to do? Are we just going to wait for Hamhuis and Ballard to get back? Are we going to have to increase the playing time of Sami Salo before he's really ready? Are Bieksa and Ehrhoff just going to have to play like crazy to try and keep our heads above water? The answer to all these questions is probably yes, but isn't there anything else we can do? I'll make a small suggestion.
The Baumer. Why are we struggling with low ice time for a clearly still injured Sami Salo or Andrew Alberts when we have Nolan Baumgartner sitting at Manitoba? Isn't it time to pull him up and have him plug a hole? In 50 games in the AHL so far, he has 3 goals, 22 assists, 28 penalty minutes, and a +4 rating. He's 34 years old, and yet we brought him back into the fold. Why? So that he can rot on the Moose roster while we are playing with three and a half defenders? Come on! Let's stop this lack of depth on blue line, at least a little bit. Let's stop trying to plug holes with players who are, at best, playing 50%. I mean, I love Tanev, but wouldn't it be nice if Baumgartner could come up and play twice as much to give Bieksa and Ehrhoff a little rest? He can do it, just let him.
At 36-12-9, the Vannies are still tops in the NHL, but have played two more games than Philly. Tonight, we're right back at it, going against Minnie on the road at 5 pm. Surprisingly, the Canucks have lost 4 straight times at the Wild's Xcel Energy Center. A win would really do a lot to get us right back on track quickly. Cory Schneider is going to be in between the pipes, so let's get it done.
-- Sent from my Palm Prē
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