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Merry Christmas - Vancouver Canucks are NHL's stingiest team in Dec so far! |
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Merry Christmas!
However you celebrate, if you celebrate, I hope you have a wonderful day.
Thank you for reading, commenting and keeping our little corner of the hockey world so lively and entertaining, 365 days of the year. I can hardly believe that this is our sixth Christmas together!
A little Instagram stalking has revealed that, with four days off, Canucks players have scattered far and wide for the holidays.
To list a few: the Horvats and Baertschis have headed up to Whistler, Brock Boeser is back in Minnesota celebrating his young nephew's first Christmas, Michael Del Zotto is home in Toronto with his family, Sam Gagner has reunited for the moment in Edmonton with his wife and kids and Ben Hutton has joined Jake Virtanen out in the Fraser Valley for an Abbotsford Christmas.
The group will eventually reconvene in Edmonton on Thursday to kick off a six-game, 10-day road trip.
If I'd told you at the beginning of the season that the Canucks would hit the Christmas break just one point out of a Western Conference wild-card spot, you'd be pretty impressed, right? Vancouver's heavy schedule still gives the team a leg up on a lot of the competition—tied with Vegas and Chicago at the break with a league-high 39 games played, while St. Louis is the most rested team with just 34 games played to date.
Though the Canucks currently sit 10th in the Western Conference standings, just one point behind eighth-place Edmonton and ninth-place Dallas, their .487 points percentage ranks them 11th in the West, well behind ninth-place Minnesota (.529) and 10th-place Dallas (.527). The first three months of the season have given us plenty of highs and lows but over the last couple of weeks, I feel like we've seen the team take some significant steps forward in terms of compete level and willingness to play for each other. Whether it was coming from behind on the road against Nashville and Columbus, shutting down Connor McDavid and the Oilers or the snarl on display against the Tampa Bay Lightning last week, these Canucks seem to be developing—dare I say it?—some swagger.
But lots can change in the second half. Last year at Christmas, the Canucks were two games under .500 with a 15-17-5 record but had gone 1-7-1 over their previous nine games as they dealt with the injuries to Bo Horvat, Sven Baertschi, Brandon Sutter and Chris Tanev, as well as the eventual retirement of last season's spiritual leader, Derek Dorsett.
The two bright spots through Christmas last season: Brock Boeser—who was at 20-14-34 in 34 games at Christmas thanks to a stunning shooting percentage of 21.1 And Thomas Vanek, the wily vet who sat fourth in team scoring with 10-13-23 in 37 games and helped revive what had been a moribund Vancouver power play.
As well as the injuries, the other dark spot was Vancouver's defensive game. Here are the goals against from that nine-game slide before Christmas one year ago: 4-4-5-7-3-6-7-5-3. Yikes.
By last Christmas, the Canucks had given up 119 goals in 37 games for an average of 3.22 goals per game.
This year, the team's injury swoon happened earlier but even while Jacob Markstrom mostly went it alone while Anders Nilsson was sidelined, the goals-against numbers during that 1-10-1 stretch that ended in early December aren't as bad as one year earlier—and had started trending back in the right direction even before the wins started to come again: 2-5-6-3-6-4-4-2-2-4-2-3.
Though scoring is up overall this season, the Canucks have given up 123 goals in 39 games through Christmas and are now averaging 3.15 goals against per game. Again, not a huge improvement on the surface, but the team is trending emphatically in the right direction.
With just 25 goals allowed in 11 December games, the Canucks have actually been the NHL's stingiest team so far this month, giving up just 2.27 goals per game.
A big part of the team's defensive success has come from the suddenly airtight penalty kill, which is third-best in the league with a 31-for-34 success rate in December for 89.3 percent. For the year, they're still ranked 19th at 78.9 percent, which gives you an idea of just how big of a turnaround this has been since Jay Beagle came back from his injury.
Beagle and Markus Granlund have been Travis Green's top penalty-killing forwards, and have really started to gel as a pair, while Loui Eriksson and Antoine Roussel have also proven effective as a second unit.
Anyway. I wasn't planning on getting so analytical on a holiday but I think it's interesting—and rather surprising—to see these dramatic improvements in the defensive part of the Canucks' game, especially while top shutdown centre Brandon Sutter is still on the sidelines.
This seems like a seismic shift from past years. Some of the credit goes to Jacob Markstrom but I think it's pretty amazing to see Vancouver getting stingy with the same defensive crew that was so maligned last year—and with two of their three offseason free-agent signings also apparently making an important two-way impact, as had been hoped on July 1.
Tim Schaller may not have turned out to be an impact player so far, but Jay Beagle and Antoine Roussel have met or perhaps even exceeded expectations.
If you missed it earlier this week, Ed Willes of The Province had a great story outlining how it's no coincidence that Roussel's game is so reminiscent of Alex Burrows. The bond between the two agitators runs much deeper than I'd realized:
That's a good jumping-off point to Roberto Luongo's lengthy sit-down interview with Elliotte Friedman and Jeff Marek on this week's "31 Thoughts" podcast, which is well worth a listen for Canucks fans:
In a candid and wide-ranging interview, Luongo namechecks Burrows as the Canucks teammate he believes was 'most misunderstood' outside the locker room and spares no details when describing his infamous 'bathroom break' episode from the 2007 Stanley Cup playoffs, among plenty of other topics.
With his 40th birthday approaching in April, he admits that it takes a lot more work than it once did to keep his body functioning at the highest level but says he doesn't really care about climbing the all-time record lists for goaltenders. He's still after more playoffs and a chance to chase the Stanley Cup again.
Next up: a quick hit on new hockey books out for the holiday season.
I've just started "Born Into It: A Fan's Life" by actor and "Goon" writer/director Jay Baruchel, and I'm super impressed in the early going. Though I wouldn't characterize myself as a fan of his work, particularly, and though his loyalty falls with the Montreal Canadiens, Baruchel is a terrific writer. He is deftly interweaving ideas about hockey's cultural significance within the context of everything from family roots to the 1995 Quebec referendum to how hockey bonds Canadian expats together in Hollywood to the everlasting bonds of friendship that are forged by the game. Really good stuff.
I've just finished "Hockey Fight in Canada," the chronicle by The Globe and Mail writer David Shoalts of Rogers Media's game-changing $5.2 billion, 12-year broadcast rights deal with the NHL. It's no secret that I'm fascinated by the business of sports and the inner workings of sports media. The book feels to me like it may have pushed right up against its deadline to go to print in time for the holidays, but it does contain some well-sourced stories of how Rogers swept in to snatch the broadcast rights away from TSN/Bell Media, the impact of the move on the CBC and Hockey Night in Canada, and how the braintrust was forced to pivot back from some of their more innovative initiatives after the first couple of years.
Rogers is now in Year 5 of the deal, and it feels like the broadcast crews have mostly settled into a groove. But Sportsnet president Scott Moore, who was integral in delivering the Rogers deal, has not yet been permanently replaced after leaving his position at the beginning of this season. Once a new top dog is installed, more changes could still be on the horizon.
Other hockey books that I haven't read yet but are getting plenty of attention this season include Bob McKenzie's latest tome, "Everyday Hockey Heroes," as well as a memoir from Curtis Joseph and a bio of Johnny Bower.
Finally—a quick note on World Juniors to wrap up today. Teams are hitting the ice for Christmas Day practices and final rosters are also due. On Monday, Quinn Hughes was named as an alternate captain for Team USA along with his Michigan teammate Josh Norris. Another returnee, Mikey Anderson, will wear the C for the Americans.
Keep an eye out for Finland's final roster. Canucks prospect Toni Utunen didn't dress in the Finns' impressive 5-2 win over Team Canada on Sunday, but he wore the C for Finland's 7-0 dismantling of Denmark earlier last week out in Langley.
As for the goaltending situation with Team Canada, I don't think there was much to choose between Michael DiPietro and Ian Scott against the Finns. The plan is for Canada to split duties in net in their first two games—on Boxing Day against Denmark, then December 27th against Switzerland. Though they're considered to be a relatively easy opponent, it was the Swiss team that gave DiPietro some trouble during the pre-tournament action in Victoria last week.
Canada is scheduled to practice at 1:30 on Christmas Day at Rogers Arena, while the Finns will hit the ice in Victoria at the same time. Those sessions should provide a little more roster clarity on both fronts.
All right, I've taken up enough of your time for today. Go eat, drink, and spend time with people you love.
Merry Christmas!
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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