Tuesday October 22 - Vancouver Canucks 5 - Detroit Red Wings 2
A rousing comeback and the first career hat trick for captain Bo Horvat in front of a large group of friends and family have sparked some very good vibes as the Vancouver Canucks return from their winning road trip off a 5-2 defeat of the Detroit Red Wings on Tuesday in Motown.
Here are your highlights:
Tuesday's win was extra-gratifying because, for 40 minutes, the game was shaping up to be a repeat of Saturday's shutout loss to the Devils. The Canucks came out aggressively and outshot the Wings 14-9 in the first period, but went to the dressing room down a goal after Anthony Mantha scored his seventh of the year with a slap-shot blast while the Canucks were two men short.
Going into Tuesday's game, the Canucks' penalty kill had only surrendered two goals all year. Midway through the second, they were down two men again, and gave up their second power-play goal of the game when Langley's Dennis Cholowski connected with his first of the year.
The Wings outshot the Canucks 17-11 in the middle frame, and it looked like the physical toll of a four-in-six road trip had caught up to Vancouver.
But the penalty calls kept coming. The teams started the third at 4-on-4, then the Canucks got a spark when Horvat got his team on the board by picking up the puck after a shot from the point by Quinn Hughes was blocked by Filip Hronek.
Seven seconds after the goal, Cholowski was sent to the box for a high stick on Josh Leivo. A minute and 25 seconds after that, Horvat converted again — also from right in front of the net.
Horvat has spoken before about growing up in the London region of southern Ontario and cheering for the Red Wings rather than the Leafs due to their proximity. The large contingent of friends and family who came down to see him play on Tuesday even managed to get a few hats on the ice when he sealed the deal with an empty-net goal with 1:12 left to play.
After recording just one assist in the Canucks' first five games, Horvat picked up five goals on the just-completed road trip and had seven shots against both the Rangers and the Red Wings. Wearing the C seems to have given him license to be more emotional on the ice. And according to his new linemate Jake Virtanen, who scored the game winner, he is also raising his game in the locker room.
Given that Quinn Hughes' parents live in Michigan, I'm guessing that they were also probably at the game on Tuesday — and able to keep a lower profile than they did in New Jersey on Saturday. If they were there, they got to see their oldest son collect his fourth and fifth assists of the young season as he settles into his new role as power-play quarterback.
Afer Jeff Blashill coached Hughes with Team USA at the 2018 World Championship, I was positive that the Red Wings would grab him at six in the draft that June, one spot ahead of Vancouver. Just as the Minnesota media never let the Wild forget that they could have taken local boy Brock Boeser three spots before Vancouver selected him in 2015, now the Wings writers are holding Detroit's feet to the fire for picking Filip Zadina (currently with one goal in five games this in Grand Rapids) over Hughes.
Credit to Blashill for staying philosophical when talking about Hughes on Tuesday.
“I really liked Quinn when I had him,” Blashill said. “He did a really good job for us. Could I have predicted he’s top-four (defenseman) a year later with a team that’s wining? I don’t know that you can ever predict that for certain, but I like a couple things about Quinn. He cares a ton and he loves hockey. He wants to be a hockey player, he’s got big-time passion for hockey and he’s willing to get better.
“If you care a ton and you work at it and you’re willing to listen and get better, you’re going to maximize your ability. And that’s what Quinn does. I’m a big fan of Quinn’s."
Blashill says he understands why his hands-on experience with Hughes shouldn't have been the difference-maker for Detroit at the draft.
“Listen, I saw one guy a lot and a whole bunch of guys not very much. How can I have a real grasp on comparables and things like that?” he said. “And I also don’t think you should judge drafts after two years. I think you should judge them after five, six, seven years. But that’s true across the industry – (head coaches) go to the draft table and we sit there and listen. … The guys that see the players all the time make the judgements.”
While it was a surprise that Zadina fell to the sixth spot, the one person who knew Hughes wasn't going to Detroit was Quinn himself, after a heads-up from his agent....er, advisor.
“I was kind of told a couple days earlier that I wasn’t going to be going to the Red Wings,” Quinn told the media on Tuesday. “So I just wrapped my head around that.”
Quinn also offered an interesting glimpse into the chemistry that's at work in the room for the Canucks this season.
“This is really fun,” Hughes told
Ben Kuzma of The Province. “I’ve been on teams that care about winning but right now it’s early, but it’s cool being part of a group of guys who are blocking shots and fired up about winning and kind of fighting for each other toward the end of the third when we kind of had it in the bag.
“I’m the young guy here and just trying to find my way — but I’m having fun.”
Hughes also appreciated Horvat coming to his defense when he got tangled up with Detroit's Filip Hronek.
“It means a lot to know the guys have my back, which they’ve let me know,” he told
Thomas Drance of The Athletic. “It’s kind of a ‘together group’ and I’ve been on some of those teams, but college is different, it’s a lot of young guys trying to make it to the next level and there’s some scouts here and scouts there. Here it’s all about the two points, I’m just trying to do my best to help the team win.”
If Tuesday's comeback seemed uncharacteristic for the Canucks — that's because it is. During the postgame coverage on Sportsnet, John Shorthouse said the last time the Canucks scored five goals in a period was in Game 5 of the 1994 Stanley Cup Final against the New York Rangers.
Click here to take a look at the insane box score from that game. With the Canucks down 3-1 and facing elimination while the Rangers planned to lift the Stanley Cup for the first time in 54 years at Madison Square Garden, Jeff Brown gave the Canucks a 1-0 lead before the first period turned very physical.
With no scoring in the second, Geoff Courtnall and Pavel Bure extended the lead to 3-0 early in the third before the Rangers fought back to tie the game. But Dave Babych put Vancouver ahead for good just 29 seconds after Mark Messier had scored the tying goal, then Courtnall and Bure both added their second of the game within the next four minutes to send the series back to Vancouver for Game 6.
When the Canucks went down 3-1 to Calgary in the first round that year, I was grudgingly persuaded that the season was as good as over and it would be safe to book a Mexican vacation for June. As a result, I ended up watching Games 4, 5 and 6 of the final on ESPN on the tube TV in a hotel room in Puerto Vallarta.
I'd forgotten just how crazy Game 5 actually was. No wonder the city was so fired up heading into Game 7!
You have to go back one more year to find the last time the Canucks scored five in the third during the regular season.
That was the final game of the 1992-93 regular season, and saw the Canucks erase a 5-3 deficit after two periods for an 8-6 win over the Los Angeles Kings — in another penalty-filled affair.
I dug back as far as 1980 in the
NHL Records page, and even though there are a few other examples of five-goal third periods, I didn't find another one where Vancouver didn't give up at least one goal along the way.
Shots were 16-7 for the Canucks in the third in Detroit on Tuesday. After playing well in the first two periods, Jacob Markstrom kept the door closed in the third to help secure the comeback win.
Even with all the firepower during the Presidents' Trophy years, it has been 17 years since we've seen a third-period hat trick from a Canucks player, too.
The Canucks now head home with a little time for rest. They'll host Washington on Friday and Florida next Monday before celebrating Halloween with a scary 3-in-4 California road trip.
With Oscar Fantenberg how healthy and off IR, Ashton Sautner was re-assigned to Utica on Wednesday. Despite five straight healthy scratches, Adam Gaudette remains with the big club.
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