Friday March 11 - Washington Capitals 4 - Vancouver Canucks 3 (OT)
Sunday Mar 13 - Tampa Bay Lightning at Vancouver Canucks - 7 p.m. PT
Meaningful hockey in March.
That was the vibe at Rogers Arena on Friday night, as the Vancouver Canucks gained a point but saw their three-game winning streak snapped against the Washington Capitals.
It was one of those nights where the hockey gods weren't smiling on the Canucks, especially early. The Caps took a 1-0 lead just 5:34 into the game, when the puck took a strange bounce off the end boards and caromed back out before Evgeny Kuznetsov deflected it past Thatcher Demko. Nineteen seconds later, Nils Hoglander took a penalty and the Caps were quick to double their lead, with an Alex Ovechkin one-timer that Kuznetsov nudged across the goal line, robbing his captain of the tally that would have moved him into third place on the all-time goals list.
We saw Matthew Highmore and Travis Hamonic leave the ice for a time, but both were able to return to the game. The Sportsnet broadcast crew of John Shorthouse and John Garrett also noticed that Elias Pettersson appeared to have injured his left wrist in the third period, and was trying to shake it out at the bench.
That makes me nervous, given how innocuous his wrist injury seemed when it first surfaced last season, and how much of a long-term drag it ended up being on his performance. Pettersson did pick up an assist on Friday, but managed just one shot on goal on four shot attempts. Two of those came in the final minutes, after Kuznetsov had tied the game 3-3 on his hat-trick goal. One went over the net; the other was blocked by Tom Wilson.
I seem to have breezed past the fun part of the game, when the Canucks came out with guns blazing to start the third period, and briefly held a 3-2 lead. Quinn Hughes levelled up with a goal and two assists, and Bo Horvat suddenly looked like playoff Horvat, with two goals.
J.T. Miller also extended his point streak with two more primary assists. And word is that it was Miller who handled the dressing-room speech that inspired after 40 minutes.
Given the adversity that the team faced in the game, especially in the first period, I look at this more as a point gained than a point that got away. And I thought the Canucks stood up well against Washington's physical style of play. Quinn Hughes seemed unintimidated about being matched up against hulking Tom Wilson for large chunks of the game, and Vancouver officially outhit Washington, 26-23. Luke Schenn and Bo Horvat both had five hits, and J.T. Miller was right behind with four.
And give credit to Washington. They were in a funk for the first two months of 2022, to the point where it was starting to look like their playoff spot might be in jeopardy. But they turned it around at the beginning of March, when goaltender Vitek Vanecek returned from injury, and made hay on this Western Canada road trip by picking up five of six points.
They're still in the second wild card spot in the East, but after this trip they have a probably insurmountable 13-point cushion over ninth-place Columbus. They're also now just three points behind the New York Rangers, who have had lost their last two games by pretty significant margins.
And speaking of playoff races...
As of Saturday morning, the Canucks sit 10th in the West with 65 points.
Edmonton is ninth, with 66 points, and one game in hand. The Oilers host the Tampa Bay Lightning on Saturday night.
Dallas is eighth, with 67 points, and three games in hand. The Stars host the aforementioned slumping Rangers on Saturday.
Vegas is third in the Pacific, with 68 points and one more game played than Vancouver. The Golden Knights have now lost three in a row and just played Laurent Brossoit on back-to-back nights because Peter DeBoer was nervous to start third-stringer Logan Thompson against Pittsburgh. The Penguins won 5-2 anyway, although the game was close until the late stages.
Nashville's in the first wild card, with 70 points and two games in hand as I type this. They're midway through a matinee against St. Louis, where they fell behind 3-0. It's now 4-4 after two. Still very unclear whether the Preds will end up getting points out of this contest...
SportsClubStats did update after Friday's game, and increased Vancouver's odds by half a percentage point with their point against Washington, to 29.5% overall.
And after having Vancouver as high as 33.3% earlier in the week,
MoneyPuck has dropped them to 25.1% as of Saturday morning.
As I point out often, these numbers can change in a hurry. And Vancouver now has a busy section of the schedule coming up: five home games in eight days before the trade deadline.
The Canucks are practicing at Scotia Barn (8 Rinks) on Saturday morning at 11 a.m., ahead of their clash with the Lightning. They're probably fortunate to be catching Tampa Bay on the second half of a back-to-back. No official word yet on the Lightning's goaltending deployment, but I'd expect they'll split duties between Andrei Vasilevskiy and Brian Elliott, and they'll prrrobably use their starter against McDavid and Draisaitl.
The Lighting are also coming into Edmonton with losses in their first two games on Canadian soil on this road trip. They opened the six-gamer with a win in Chicago, then dropped a 7-4 decision in Winnipeg on Tuesday and lost 4-1 in Calgary on Thursday — their first back-to-back losses of the year. After seeing Vancouver on Saturday, they'll finish off the trip in Seattle next Wednesday.
The Canucks have seen Tampa Bay just once since their two Stanley Cup wins, losing 4-2 at Amalie Arena in mid-January. Other than the playoff bubble in Edmonton in 2020, this is the Lightning's first visit to Western Canada since December of 2018 — when they were in the midst of their 128-point season. They lost in overtime in Winnipeg before manhandling Vancouver in a penalty-filled 5-2 win, then beating Calgary in a shootout before besting the Oilers by a 6-3 score.
So even though the Canucks aren't on Hockey Night in Canada this week, Saturday's late game is very important for Vancouver. With any luck, the Lightning bump their slump, with Vasilevskiy in net, and keep the Oilers from picking up points — in a physical game that leaves them too drained to play their best on Sunday as they suit up for their fourth game in six nights.
Surely that's not too much to ask?
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
Join the Discussion:
»