The Vancouver Canucks held their annual Dice & Ice Charity Event on Wednesday night, with proceeds supporting the Canucks for Kids Fund.
It's always nice to see the boys dressed up, though formalwear doesn't take away from Eddie Lack's sense of fun:
If you're morbidly curious about the state of Kevin Bieksa's hand—yep, it's bandaged:
The Canucks are back on the ice at Rogers Arena today. As expected, Derek Dorsett and Brad Richardson are absent. For the time being, Ryan Stanton is filling in on the fourth-line left-wing spot.
Willie has broken up his top defensive pairing today, trying Alex Edler with Luca Sbisa and Chris Tanev with Yannick Weber. Not so sure I like this idea!
It's now official: those of you who were advocating for Ronalds Kenins to replace Dorsett might get your wish. John Pitarresi of the
Utica Observer-Dispatch says he's probably going to be the Canucks call-up:
Kenins is listed at 6'0" and 209 pounds. Here's how the 23-year-old is described over at
Elite Prospects:
A forward who plays every shift with a lot of dynamic and high intensity. Ronald Kenins creates scoring chances using his explosive acceleration and good speed. Battles hard for the puck and is not afraid to go into hot areas to score goals. He has a lot of offensive upside and is a perfect addition to an energy line.
Sounds good to me! Kenins hasn't exactly been lighting the lamp in Utica this season, but it'll be interesting if we get a chance to see how his game translates at an NHL level. Kenins is a restricted free agent at the end of this season—he might be a younger, less expensive option than one of the pending UFAs Dorsett, Matthias or Richardson.
Another note from practice:
Bonino is subbing in for Alex Burrows, who was all-but-invisible in Tuesday's game against Anaheim despite 15:54 of ice time. He was a minus-one, on the ice for Matt Beleskey's opening goal, though that's a case where plus-minus doesn't really mean much—Ryan Miller whiffed on a shot he should have had.
The rest of Burrows' stat line is virtually empty: one missed shot and one block. That matches up with my eye test: usually, he's noticeable in his special-teams roles and mixing it up after whistles, but I really didn't notice him or Chris Higgins at all.
Burrows is tied for second in team scoring with 10 goals, along with Nick Bonino and Jannik Hansen, but just two of those goals have come in the last 11 games, since New Year's.
The Canucks' power play has also fallen off the map—again. It clicked twice against the NHL's 28th-best penalty-kill in Philadelphia, but that has been the only production from the last nine games. Definitely time to change things up.
It seems Ryan Stanton has a thing or two to learn about playing the wing in practice:
It's being reported that Lack is back on his feet and practice has now resumed. Close call!
That's the latest scuttlebutt for today. The Canucks are getting a softball for their next game: The Buffalo Sabres have now lost 12 in a row—their last win was more than a month ago, on December 27th and their last regulation win was on December 11. In addition, they'll be coming into a back-to-back situation after their game in Edmonton tonight.
The "Tank Nation" voices will get loud if the Canucks don't take two points from this contest...
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