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Travis Greens tweaks lines & PP units looking for bounce-back vs. Panthers |
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Thursday January 9 - Vancouver Canucks at Florida Panthers - 7 p.m. - Sportsnet Pacific, Sportsnet 650
Vancouver Canucks: 43 GP, 23-16-4, 50 pts, fifth in Pacific Division
Florida Panthers: 43 GP, 22-16-5, 49 pts, fourth in Atlantic Division
The Vancouver Canucks will look to quickly diffuse the stench of their 9-2 loss to the Tampa Bay Lightning on Tuesday when they visit the Florida Panthers on Thursday in Sunrise.
The good news is that this formula has already been successful once this year. After blowing their 5-1 lead to the Washington Capitals and losing in overtime on October 25, the Canucks righted the ship against the Panthers three nights later with a 7-2 win which featured three-assist performances from Elias Pettersson and Alex Edler, and a win for Thatcher Demko.
That night, the Panthers were on a back-to-back after winning in Edmonton the day before. This time around, they've been sitting in Sunrise, waiting for the Canucks, after kicking off a four-game homestand with a 5-2 loss to Arizona on Tuesday.
Broadly speaking, Florida's season has been a lot like Vancouver's, with plenty of highs and lows. Of course, they're in a transition phase with prestigious new coach Joel Quenneville behind the bench and two-time Vezina Trophy winner Sergei Bobrovsky locked up for seven years.
Bob will start against the Canucks — and I'm sure you've heard that his adjustment hasn't been great so far. He has a 15-12-4 record with a 3.33 goals-against average and .895 save percentage, and was spelled off by 25-year-old rookie Chris Driedger for the last two games.
I have always championed the idea that a big part of Bobrovsky's Vezina success in Columbus was his work with goaltending coach Ian Clark, who has also made a positive impression with Jacob Markstrom and Thatcher Demko since joining the Canucks at the beginning of the 2018-19 season. But I also remember that Bobrovsky was in an early-season funk in Columbus last year, too, which had me wondering what kind of contract he'd be able to fetch as a UFA.
Bobrovsky bottomed out in January last year, going 2-5-0 with a 4.18 GAA and .858 save percentage, then turned things right around. From February 1 till the end of the season, he was 19-11-0 with a 2.29 GAA and .921 save percentage as the Blue Jackets made their successful push for the playoffs. He went to 2.41 and .925 in the playoffs, backstopped the Blue Jackets' big upset of the Lightning and boom — seven years, $70 million.
If that pattern is any indication, Bob might not be great against Vancouver on Thursday, but he'll probably get dialled in and get Florida into a playoff spot by April.
Heading into the game, the Panthers are 10th in the East, three points out of a wild-card spot and five back of Toronto in the Atlantic. Meanwhile, the Canucks have slipped to ninth in the West — one point behind both Edmonton and Calgary, who now hold down third and fourth spots in the Pacific, but still just four points behind Arizona and Vegas, who are tied for first.
The Canucks' original plan was to take Wednesday off to enjoy the Florida sunshine but Travis Green called a practice instead, to help put Tuesday's loss in the rearview mirror.
As I mentioned in Wednesday's blog, Green swapped Jake Virtanen and Brock Boeser on his forward lines at practice. He also made a tweak to the power-play units.
The Canucks are in a rare two-game drought without a power-play goal, and Boeser's in a personal scoring slump. His 40 points in 43 games have him easily on pace for a new career high in total points this season, but he comes into Thursday's game on a six-game goalless streak, and hasn't scored a power-play goal since November 21 in Nashville — another good bounce-back effort from the Canucks earlier in the season, after they were embarrassed 6-1 by Dallas.
As for the Panthers, here's how they rolled their lines at practice on Wednesday.
Watch out for Jonathan Huberdeau, who was named the NHL's First Star for December after posting a league-leading 6 goals and 22 points in 13 games. He's now up to 57 points in 43 games — seventh in league scoring.
You might remember Noel Acciari as the player who fought Bo Horvat when he was a member of the Boston Bruins in October of 2018. Acciari signed a three-year, $5-million free-agent contract with the Panthers this summer, and made headlines last month when he scored back-to-back hat tricks against Ottawa and Dallas. After finishing last season with a career-high 14 points, 28-year-old Acciari has delivered good value for Florida — he's now up to 15 goals for the year.
After practicing on Wednesday, the Canucks are skipping their morning skate, so we won't get any more lineup notes until closer to gametime.
It's another early start. Enjoy!
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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