Vancouver Canucks at Minnesota Wild - Wednesday March 26 - 4:30 p.m. - Sportsnet Pacific, Fox Sports North
Vancouver Canucks - 33-30-10 - 76 points - 10th in Western Conference
Minnesota Wild - 37-24-11 - 85 points - 7th in Western Conference
After winning a couple of cupcakes back home in Vancouver, the Canucks will face much stiffer competition with two games in two nights against tough Central Division opponents, starting Wednesday with the Minnesota Wild.
It looks like the refocusing in Minnesota is starting to take hold. Rather than the usual post-Christmas swoon as the team gets ravaged by injuries, the Wild are sitting comfortably in seventh place in the West and making their playoff plans. Their biggest issue is in net, where starters Josh Harding and Niklas Backstrom are both out for the season. Darcy Kuemper will get the nod tonight against Vancouver though it's funny—after starting 16 straight games in injury relief, Kuemper has just one win since Ilya Bryzgalov was brought in at the trade deadline, while Bryz is undefeated with a 2-0-2 record.
The Wild also pumped up their offense at the deadline with the acquisition of Matt Moulson. He has fit in nicely on a second line with Mikko Koivu and Charlie Coyle, and is 4-4-8 in 10 games with Minnesota.
Ex-Canuck Keith Ballard is questionable for Wednesday's game due to a strained groin.
The Wild have beaten Vancouver in both previous meetings this year—3-2 in Minnesota back in December and 2-1 in Vancouver at the end of February. It'll be a tall order for the Canucks to avoid a season sweep with a win tonight.
Some good news, though (maybe) from Vancouver's morning skate at Xcel Energy Center:
Dan Murphy is skeptical about how this will work:
Henrik Sedin did not make the trip due to his injury. It looks like Shawn Matthias will slot into that role despite his success on the wing with Brad Richardson and Zack Kassian in recent games:
With Schroeder in the press box, we'll likely see Matthias, Kesler, Richardson and Zac Dalpe down the middle. I guess Daniel, Burrows and Jensen will be competing for two spots on the wing on the top line. It will be interesting to see how that shakes down.
Lack On Track:
As I worked on a piece about the Calder Trophy race for Bleacher Report yesterday, I was reminded about what a crazy ride Eddie Lack has had this year.
Setting aside the impact of the Luongo trade, let's remember back to the beginning of the season, when he was expected to jump in and replace the beloved Cory Schneider after a year-long recovery from hip surgery. Not only had Lack never played an NHL game, his overall game fitness was also a question mark.
Lack easily won over the fans in the early going with his steady play and his happy-go-lucky attitude. The waters got rough when he was forced to fill in for the injured Luongo in January, and again during the Heritage Classic incident, but despite the fact that he has now started every Canucks game since the end of the Olympic break, it looks like Lack has his feet back under him.
The circumstances surrounding the Luongo trade were so extreme, the whole team was reeling. Though he wasn't playing his best, I wasn't too eager to fault him. It seemed like his reaction was only human: I hoped he'd come around before too long.
It looks like the Canucks are lucky enough to have not just a good goalie in Lack, but one with an extremely grounded character, who really can rise above adversity. He won't win the Calder—Nathan MacKinnon almost certainly has it locked up and both Darcy Kuemper and Frederik Andersen have better goaltending numbers—but I think Lack deserves some real praise for what he has delivered this year.
Click here for my Bleacher Report story.
Playoff Watch:
On the second night of a back-to-back, with Thomas Greiss in net, the Phoenix Coyotes handed Pittsburgh just their seventh home loss of the season on Tuesday night. Dallas lost to Chicago, so the Canucks are now six points back of the Coyotes. Dallas' playoff chances dropped by 18 percent with Tuesday's outcomes, but the Canucks' dipped by just 0.4 percent—because their odds were already so low. They sit at 1.9 percent going into tonight's game.
Prospect Watch:
Thanks to nucks_94 for this quick summary of Canucks prospects lighting it up in the OHL playoffs:
I know its only the first few games of the first round, but Canucks prospects are playing well in the OHL playoffs so far!
Horvat: 7 points in 3 games
Fox: 6 points in 3 games
Cassels: 6 points in 3 games
Gaunce: 5 points in 3 games
So far so good!
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
Join the Discussion:
»