Sunday August 16 - St. Louis Blues at Vancouver Canucks - 7:30 p.m. - Sportsnet, Sportsnet 650
Vancouver leads best-of-seven first-round series 2-0
First off — apologies for going MIA for a bit. As the Vancouver Canucks are shifting to the 'home' team in the bubble in Edmonton, I flew back to Vancouver for real on Saturday — to recharge my batteries after two and a half weeks of all hockey, all the time. I'll still be covering the Western Hub from here, and plan to return to Edmonton a little further down the road, when things get really serious.
If you'd like to read a little more about how the NHL is going about recreating home-ice atmosphere in the bubbles, allow me to direct you to my story in the New York Times:
As I mention in the story, the Blues have had one of the more complete game presentation packages for their home games — but those packages are growing and evolving all the time. The St. Louis organist makes regular appearances on the big screen, a stirring recording of the Star-Spangled Banner from Enterprise Center is shown, and those infernal bells count off the goals when the Blues get scoring. But that's still a long way from the emotional lifts that the team got during its run to the Stanley Cup last year, when Laila Anderson became the Blues' emotional heart and celebrities like Jon Hamm and Jenna Fischer were front and centre.
Heading into back-to-back games against the Canucks on Sunday and Monday, the Blues still haven't won a game in the bubble. They got crushed 4-0 by Chicago in their exhibition contest, then blew leads in all three of their round-robin games. Nazem Kadri's buzzer beater gave the Blues the 2-1 loss against Colorado, then they were up 2-0 and 4-3 before ultimately losing 6-4 to Vegas, and Robert Thomas' goal from 3:43 of the first period stood up until the 19:28 mark of the third against Dallas before Joe Pavelski tied the game with the extra attacker on the ice, and Denis Gurianov won it in the shootout.
After going down 0-2 to the Canucks thanks to Bo Horvat's overtime masterpiece on Friday night, here's how the Blues and Canucks stack up statistically, so far in the summer restart:
Vancouver: 5-1-0, .833 points percentage T2 with New York Islanders
St. Louis: 0-4-1, .100 points percentage, 23rd, ahead of only New York Rangers
The Blues are the only team still alive that has yet to win a game in August.
A few more stats for comparison, now that we're starting to get a somewhat meaningful sample size:
Goals per game: Vancouver: 3.50, fifth; St. Louis 2.20, 15th
Goals against per game: Vancouver 2.50, tied for ninth with Vegas, Tampa Bay, Pittsburgh; St. Louis 3.60, 21st
Power play: Vancouver 32.1%, first; St. Louis 14.3%, tied with Boston for 16th
Penalty kill: Vancouver 83.9%, 11th; St. Louis 68%, 24th
Faceoff percentage: Vancouver 54.2%, fifth; St. Louis 53.7%, seventh
Something I forgot: just a few days after the Canucks kicked off their Phase 2 voluntary workouts at Rogers Arena, reports came out on July 3 that
'multiple members' of the Blues tested positive for Covid-19. While no official confirmations were ever given, Jim Thomas of the
St. Louis Post Dispatch reported on July 5 that four players and one coach had tested positive, and that "The problems may have started at a bar in Clayton where several team members gathered more than a week ago."
A few days after that gathering, Thomas reports that one player tested positive, followed by another player and a coach, then two more players.
I won't speculate on identities, but I can certainly see how an ordeal like this could have contributed to where the Blues find themselves right now. They had their training camp disrupted by the virus; they've got players who may have been asymptomatic, but who also may have dealt with symptoms and, at the very least, would have been in isolation for awhile and unable to skate. And they've dealt with the emotional toll of all this. While the Canucks cruised through all their return-to-play phases without issue, the Blues would have faced the realities of Covid head-on and wondered whether it's safe or worthwhile to go ahead with the summer tournament.
What a lousy way to have to try to defend your first Stanley Cup in franchise history.
But in the immortal words of Todd Bertuzzi, it is what it is. The Blues could be on their way out of the bubble as early as Monday night if they don't figure out how to contain the Canucks, who are firing on all cylinders.
The earlier start time on Friday allowed Bo Horvat to get national attention for his two highlight-reel goals.
There was the shorthanded double-deker that opened the scoring in the first period...
And the OT breakaway winner, off a sublime pass from Quinn Hughes...
Heading into Sunday's games, Horvat's six goals lead all players in the playoffs so far. He and Quinn Hughes' eight points in five games also have them both in a group of six that's tied for third in playoff scoring. The other players with eight points are Ryan Nugent-Hopkins (eliminated), Kane and Toews (could be eliminated on Sunday) and Pierre-Luc Dubois (who continues to show me why I was hoping the Canucks could grab him at five in the 2016 draft).
Just behind them, there's a group of 11 players with seven points, which includes Elias Pettersson and Brock Boeser. Tanner Pearson, J.T. Miller and Chris Tanev have six — all ahead of the Blues' leading scorer, David Perron, with five.
Through the first two games of this series, Perron has probably shown more bite than any other St. Louis player, effectively agitating every chance he gets and chipping in with timely scoring. That game-tying goal with seven seconds remaining in Game 2 has now been attributed to Jaden Schwartz, while Perron has the primary assist. So I guess that was actually a double deflection that beat Markstrom. But it's a perfect example of how impactful Perron has been for the Blues in this series.
We have a full day of hockey action on the slate for Sunday, with three games in Edmonton and two in Toronto. Like the Canucks, the Islanders have taken a 2-0 lead in their series against the Washington Capitals with a pair of 'road' wins and will try to keep their momentum going as they switch to the home role.
Then, the Flames will look to take a 3-1 stranglehold in their series against the Stars and the Golden Knights will look to eliminate the Blackhawks before the Habs try to build off their dominant win over the Flyers. Finally, at 7:30 p.m. PT, we'll get the Canucks and the Blues.
No word on whether Tyler Myers will be able to play after he was knocked out of Game 2 early in the third period after the hit from behind by Brayden Schenn. But Iain MacIntyre has reported that Myers has remained in the bubble. If he can't go, expect Jordie Benn to see his first tournament action — he has completed his quarantine requirements and is able to slot in on the right side if necessary.
Other than that, I don't expect any lineup changes for Vancouver — and I certainly expect Jacob Markstrom to take both halves of this back-to-back.
We may see a change in goal for the Blues, though. I'm thinking we'll see Jake Allen on Sunday — he was very good last week against Dallas.
Enjoy the game!
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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