Saturday April 11 - Vancouver Canucks 6 - Edmonton Oilers 5 (OT)
In a mean-nothing no-hitter to close out their regular season, the Vancouver Canucks came back twice from two-goal deficits to defeat the Edmonton Oilers 6-5 in overtime and close out their 2014-15 season on a winning note.
Here are your highlights:
Saturday night's action got off to a bit of a strange start, with the presentation of the season's team awards and the tribute to Gino Odjick blended into one tight package. If you blinked, you missed it.
Gino was the surprise presenter of the Pavel Bure most exciting player award, which was presented to Radim Vrbata. The crowd got on its feet for him, but he was gone as quickly as he'd arrived. Was the presentation rushed due to a late-ending early game on Hockey Night in Canada?
Here are the rest of the award winners:
Leading scorer - presented by Darcy Rota - Daniel Sedin
Most three-stars award - presented by Gary Bromley - Ryan Miller
Best defenseman - presented by Gerry O'Flaherty - Chris Tanev
Unsung hero - presented by Garry Monahan - Derek Dorsett
Unsurprisingly, once the game began it looked more like a preseason contest than the type of tight-checking hockey we'll expect to see next week.
Following what is now a Canuck tradition, Ryan Miller allowed goals by Nail Yakupov and Jordan Eberle before the first period was half over, signalling to his teammates that it was time to start playing hockey.
It's not easy to defend a performance where Miller gave up five goals on 28 shots, but I'm not ready to simply discard it, either.
Miller got better as the game went on and shut the door in the third period, allowing the Canucks to come back and grab the win, but it sounds like even he knows that he's not ready yet for playoff-type competition.
I thought Miller's inability to "hold his ground" was especially apparent on Edmonton's fourth goal—a breakaway effort from Benoit Pouliot. After Miller stopped the initial shot, Pouliot kept charging and forced both puck and goaltender into the net. Miller seemed especially vulnerable as I sensed he was trying to protect his knee from another collision like the one that put him out of action.
I was still unsure about how the goaltending situation would shake down when I wrote
this preview of the series for Bleacher Report last night, but I think you might enjoy it—especially the prediction part.
I'll break down the numbers in more detail over the next couple of days, but other than points-by-defensemen (where the Canucks have been much better in recent weeks), I couldn't find any areas where the Flames excelled statistically.
With his goal and assist last night, Daniel Sedin even managed to catch up to Jiri Hudler in the scoring race. The pair finished the season tied for eighth overall with 76 points, while Henrik wrapped up the year tied for 10th with 73 points and Radim Vrbata finished tied for 12th with 31 goals.
Oh yeah—did I mention that Saturday's win gave Vancouver 101 points, good for an eighth-overall finish in the NHL standings, fifth in the Western Conference? Who saw that coming a year ago??
I was also about to throw a rose out to Sven Baertschi, who made the most of his top-six ice time and a wide-open game to show us his speed and score two goal-scorer's goals.
But that's all we'll be seeing from Sven for now. The Canucks announced Sunday morning that he has been reassigned to Utica.
I think Farhan's on the right track here:
Shawn Matthias has also sat out the last two games, while Chris Higgins was scratched on Saturday in favour of Brandon McMillan—likely just a chance for Higgins to get some rest. Both McMillan and Ryan Stanton made the most of their first games in awhile: Stanton finished with seven blocked shots in 19:08 of ice time while McMillan earned an assist and led the Canucks with four hits (out of a team total of 10).
Two notes to finish up today.
First, the Canucks are holding an open practice at Rogers Arena Monday at 11 a.m. if you'd like to get your first taste of the playoff preparations—and maybe see if Zack Kassian is back skating with the team.
Second, here's Gino Odjick's thank-you letter to Canucks fans—which also includes a tall order for this year's team. I hope that spirit motivates our boys when the action gets underway on Wednesday!
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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