Monday March 17: Tampa Bay Lightning 4, Vancouver Canucks 3
The slim playoff prospects of the Vancouver Canucks took another hit on Monday when their third-period rally against the Tampa Bay Lightning fell just short. Here are your highlights:
The Lightning built a 3-0 lead on a combination of talent and lucky breaks. They opened the scoring on their first power-play opportunity of the game, when Steven Stamkos was left unguarded in his favourite spot at the left circle.
After that, Ryan Stanton was the goat on two own-goals, but both came after the Canucks gave up odd-man rushes following thwarted opportunities at the other end of the ice. The breakdowns happened well before Stanton ended up in the wrong place at the wrong time.
The second period was really the team's undoing, as they came out flat. The Canucks were outshot 13-7 and outscored 2-0 in that middle frame before mounting their charge in the third.
Once again, I'm grudgingly impressed by the effort that they were able to put out near the end of the game—especially on a back-to-back at the end of a road trip. Nick Jensen provided the spark once again, and Alex Burrows put up another three points as the Canucks scored in every way imaginable: first on the power play, then at even strength, and finally shorthanded, with a nice conversion by Jannik Hansen.
Alas, Eddie Lack let a Tom Pyatt shot get past him in the third as well, so the Canucks head back to Vancouver with a 2-2 record on their latest "critical" road trip, with their position and future as muddy as ever.
Alex Burrows has always been a streaky player, but he more than doubled his year's point total on this trip! In four games, Burrows put up his only five goals of the season and added three assists, bringing his stat line for the season to 5-9-14.
I remember seeing Burrows' back-to-back hat tricks when I first started covering Canucks games live back in January 2010. It's great to see him rounding back into form as his confidence returns.
The Canucks play just two games for the rest of the week—and they should be another two softballs. Nashville visits Rogers Arena on Wednesday, then host Cody Hodgson and the Buffalo Sabres on Sunday afternoon.
Even if they win both games, chances are the playoff picture will look a lot worse by week's end. They'll sit idle while the teams above them, Dallas and Phoenix, start to make up those games in hand.
The Coyotes beat the Los Angeles Kings on Monday night, so they're now in eighth place in the Western Conference, five points up on the Canucks with two extra games to play. The odds from SportsClubStats.com now show the Canucks with just a 1.3 percent chance of squeaking into the postseason.
The gap in the schedule would also be a logical time for ownership and/or management to finally issue some sort of statement to the fans about the future of the franchise. Mike Gillis promised a webchat for season-ticket holders upon his return to town, so it'll be interesting to see what's said.
Though I know some of you are less-than-pleased by the idea, Markus Naslund's name continues to get some play as a potential new member of the management group. Jim Jamieson of
The Province spoke to Naslund himself, and seems to think that all options remain on the table, including a possible return to North America.
Click here/a> to read the story.
Another Injury:
The other bit of bad news out of Monday's game was the Canucks' inevitable injury-of-the-week. Once again, Chris Tanev came up snake-eyes after blocking a Steven Stamkos shot:
Tanev has only been back for 10 games from his fractured thumb. Is this the same hand?
Torts Loves Tampa:
John Tortorella was part of Tampa Bay's ceremony to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the team's 2004 Stanley Cup win, when Torts was behind their bench. The ceremony was obviously timed in order for Torts to be included, and he made the most of his moment.
It was pretty strange, seeing him show more emotion for the opposition than he has shown for the Canucks in awhile.
Jason Botchford quotes Torts on the moment in
The Provies, where he explains it like this:
I think I’ve been criticized a little bit in here in that I haven’t really acknowledged (what the Cup team accomplished) when I’ve come here other times.
I was not going to make that mistake. Because I owe that to the team. This organization who did this for us, that 04 team, it’s just a first class move.
I’m honoured to be a part of it. I was nervous. But I’m so glad I got to see those guys. It’s a true story where you do walk forever.
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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