Tuesday March 1 - New York Islanders 3 - Vancouver Canucks 2
The New York Islanders got a healthy assist from the Vancouver Canucks, as own goals were the story of Vancouver's latest loss at Rogers Arena on Tuesday night.
Here are your highlights:
After all the drama of the last few days, the Canucks had decent jump in the early going and outshot the sluggish Islanders 6-2 in the opening frame.
Unfortunately, New York's first shot at 4:20 of the first period deflected past a startled Jacob Markstrom off of—who else?—Dan Hamhuis.
The goal was credited to Travis Hamonic, who had a very busy night. Despite missing a good chunk of the second period after a fight with Emerson Etem, Hamonic finished second on his team with 23:45 of icetime and tallied two shots, three other attempts that were blocked, two hits, one takeaway, a block and a minor penalty to go along with his major.
A player we don't see very often out here on the west coast, he was a force—a more complete package than any Canucks defenseman.
I can see why Garth Snow values him but man, he is exactly the kind of blue line upgrade that Vancouver needs. What would it take to pry him away during the offseason?
Would you be willing to build a package around Ben Hutton? The rookie still needs to prove that he can sustain his current level of play over the long term but considering how deep we now are in the season, he's holding up well so far. Thanks to 2:13 of power-play time, Hutton eclipsed Chris Tanev and set a new career high with 25:08 logged last night—and picked up his 18th assist on Linden Vey's first period power-play goal.
Hutton has the potential to be very good for a long time, but because he basically came out of nowhere this season, I'd be willing to consider giving him up if a stud like Hamonic was coming back in return.
Overall, the first period was a bit of a snoozer. Then, emotions heated up in the second when Derek Dorsett tangled with Matt Martin shortly after the Hamonic/Etem bought.
According to HockeyFights.com, last night's tilt was only the second fight of Emerson Etem's career—and his first in three seasons. It was nice to see him provide a bit of grit as he skated shotgun with the Sedins, and he said all the right things about sticking up for teammates in the between-periods interview with Joey Kenward that we saw in the arena.
The Islanders re-took the lead late in the second when a pinballing puck that bounced past Markstrom off the skate of Ben Hutton was ruled to have completely crossed the goal line after a TV timeout and video review. In the third, the game opened up, with 14 shots apiece for each side. The Sedin line combined to tie the game at 10:55 but the Islanders jumped back in front for good just 2:03 later when Thomas Hickey's point shot fooled Markstrom after making contact with Chris Tanev.
The empty seats at Rogers Arena are now starting to creep into the upper bowl but there was one mega-VIP on hand on Tuesday. Wayne Gretzky was camped out in a luxury box on the 500 level for some sort of corporate gathering, and left his mark on the elevator we use to get to the press box on his way out of the building.
Tuesday's loss didn't impact Vancouver's position in the standings at all. Still eight points out of the wild card and still 23rd overall. Buffalo and Edmonton did the Canucks a solid by generating a three-point game against each other. The Oilers got the win but the Sabres' loser point moves them just two points behind Vancouver.
As you probably heard by now, Jannik Hansen missed Tuesday's game and will be out for a bit, as Willie likes to say.
Coach Desjardins said Hansen injured his ribs and will be out at least a week. #Canucks
Hansen's injury got me thinking about the trade deadline again, and the missed opportunity to make a deal while his market value would have been at an all-time high. However...
Benning was asked about trading Hansen. Basically said it wasn't even considered, despite interest from a few teams.
As soon as I accepted the fact that the playoffs were out of reach for the Canucks a couple of weeks ago, Hansen became an obvious trade chip in my mind—a value player who had a chance to bring a more meaningful return than the the UFAs with their no-trade clauses.
Now I hear that teams did express interest, and they didn't even attempt to market their asset or see how high they could drive the asking price?
I think that's a bigger indictment of how this management group is operating than the Hamhuis fiasco.
The Carolina Hurricanes are hardly the poster children for successful rebuilding, but they're only four points away from making the playoffs for the first time in seven years. If Jim Benning was running that team, they'd have been buying on Monday. Instead, Ron Francis found the courage to deal away longtime captain Eric Staal—to the only team he'd waive for—and get some assets in return.
New Jersey's only five points out, and they unloaded their leading scorer Lee Stempniak. But the Canucks value Hansen to much to even consider moving him? Grrrr.
Now that I have that off my chest, I'll leave you today with this link to Jason Botchford's latest edition of The Provies.
For all the conflicting reports we've heard about what did and didn't happen around the Dan Hamhuis non-deal, Botch has done a good job of putting together a plausible sequence of events that incorporates all the bits and pieces in a way that makes sense. Unless I hear otherwise, I'll assume that this version is pretty much on the money.
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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