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Chris Tanev returns, Granlund with Sedins as Canucks face Blue Jackets
January 12, 2018, 2:15 PM ET [593 Comments]
Carol Schram
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • RSS • Archive • CONTACT
Friday January 12 - Vancouver Canucks at Columbus Blue Jackets - 4 p.m. - Sportsnet Pacific, Sportsnet 650

Vancouver Canucks: 43 GP, 16-21-6, 38 pts, seventh in Pacific Division
Columbus Blue Jackets: 45 GP, 25-17-3, 53 pts, second in Metropolitan Division

Chris Tanev is in and Brandon Sutter is not when the Vancouver Canucks continue their road trip in Columbus on Friday night.




Tanev looks pretty good, all things considered. He describes the damage from Toronto as "six and a half" teeth lost. Now we know why Michael Del Zotto could only find four on the ice.




Here's how the lines looked at practice in Columbus on Thursday:




The forward lines have been juggled again. I believe this is the first time this year we've seen Markus Granlund elevated to play with the Sedins.

Sutter did practice on Thursday, and talked with Jeff Paterson about why he has been out so long.




You won't get anything too specific about an injury that Sutter describes as "lower body-ish," but we do learn that it's not related to the sports hernia surgery that he had two years ago, and that he didn't need surgery this time around—just rest and rehab.

Sutter's last game was November 24 in New Jersey—the Canucks were 11-9-3 after that game. Things got worse, for sure, after Bo Horvat was injured on December 5 but all told, Vancouver's record has been 5-12-3 while Sutter has been out—13 of a possible 40 points.

The Canucks will try to make that 15 out of 42 tonight as they'll be the rested team going up against the Blue Jackets—who dropped a 3-1 decision to Buffalo on the road on Thursday.

I did Stats for that game. Even though Columbus fired 45 shots at Sabres' goaltender Linus Ullmark—playing his first NHL game of the year after being recalled from Rochester earlier this week—it sure didn't seem like the Blue Jackets were getting many quality scoring chances. Seth Jones was the one player who seemed dangerous. He led the team with seven shots on goal and also hit a couple of posts.

After scoring just eight goals in their last six games, Columbus is ranked 27th offensively in the league, averaging 2.60 goals per game. That's just a shade above Vancouver, sitting in 28th at 2.58.

The reason why Columbus is in a playoff spot and the Canucks are not comes from the back end. Sergei Bobrovsky isn't quite at his Vezina levels from last season, but he has played more minutes than any other goalie in the league and is still delivering high-end numbers with a 21-13-3 record, 2.39 goals-against average and .922 save percentage. Bob played in Buffalo on Thursday so the Canucks might see backup Joonas Korpisalo tonight. He's 4-4-0 with a 3.10 GAA and .904 save percentage.

As the Canucks bask in the glory of Brock Boeser's selection to the All-Star team—the only rookie to make the cut this year—tonight we'll get a look at a first-year player for Columbus who was on the radar for Vancouver in the summer of 2016. Pierre-Luc Dubois was selected two picks before Olli Juolevi and has quickly matured into a full-time NHLer.

Dubois is 10-12-22 in 45 games and has recently been elevated to Columbus' first-line centre role, playing with Artemi Panarin and Josh Anderson. We know how John Tortorella likes to ride his favourite players—since New Year's, Dubois has been averaging well over 20 minutes of ice time per game.

To wrap up today, a few other quick notes.

I already mentioned Brock Boeser's new status as NHL All-Star. That earns him his second Schedule A Bonus of the year, following on the heels of scoring his 20th goal. That puts him up to $425,000 in bonus money on top of his $925,000 in rookie salary this season.




If you missed it, there will be a ton of Canucks content on Team Canada at the Olympics this year:




And don't forget Coach Willie!

Canada's Olympic journey begins against Switzerland on February 15 at 4:10 a.m PT. You gettin' up?

Meanwhile, over in Sweden, Jonathan Dahlen is doing good things as he makes his way back onto our radar following the conclusion of World Juniors.




Dahlen tells Rick Dhaliwal today that he's working on his skating and quickness before he comes over next year.




As for his plans for the rest of the season...it sounds like he's still undecided, but is definitely staying in Sweden.




Meanwhile, over in Utica, GM Ryan Johnson has praise for Thatcher Demko, who's keeping his injury-ravaged team in a playoff spot, and a grim-but-not-unexpected update on Will Lockwood.




Enjoy the game!
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