Monday January 4 - Vancouver Canucks vs. Arizona Coyotes - 7:00 p.m. - Sportsnet Pacific, TSN1040
Vancouver Canucks: 39 GP, 15-15-9, 39 pts, fourth in Pacific Division
Arizona Coyotes: 38 GP, 18-16-4, 40 pts, second in Pacific Division
Time to leave the disappointment of Team Canada's loss in the rearview mirror. The Vancouver Canucks are winners of three of their last four games and face a key division rival tonight when the Arizona Coyotes roll into Rogers Arena.
With a game in hand, the Coyotes currently sit one point ahead of the Canucks in the standings. Vancouver was knocked down to fourth place last night when the Anaheim Ducks beat Winnipeg 4-1 to put themselves in a playoff position for the first time all season.
Just two points separate second place from sixth in the Pacific Division standings today.
The latest player to be added to the Canucks' injured list is Brandon Prust, who appears to have suffered a knee injury when he got tangled up with Ryan Kesler in the third period of Friday night's win over Anaheim.
Ben Kuzma has the video of the collision in
this story for
The Province.
As one might expect, the Canucks have listed Prust as day-to-day. This morning, they added another forward to their mix when they recalled Alex Grenier from Utica.
Looks like it's nothing too serious for Prust. He, Grenier and Sven Baertschi are all on the ice at Rogers Arena this morning:
Earlier, some of the other injured players also skated.
Ryan Miller was also in the ice, but Jacob Markstrom will start his fifth straight game tonight.
Here's how the lines looked at practice on Sunday:
Ronalds Kenins is skating in Sven Baertschi's spot with Horvat and Vrbata, Jared McCann has drawn back into the lineup between Chris Higgins and Derek Dorsett and Linden Vey moves to the wing with Alex Burrows and Adam Cracknell.
With the Canucks now riding a power-play drought that can reach double digits if it doesn't connect tonight, Jared McCann has moved onto the second unit, in place of Higgins.
With six goals in November and five in December—and his chemistry with the Sedins—the idea of using Jannik Hansen on the power play is being tossed around in the media, but nothing has come of it so far.
“I haven’t played the power play since my time in Winnipeg (AHL) and it’s never really been a question here,” Hansen told Kuzma on Sunday. “We have so many good offensive guys it’s never come up. I’m happy with the ice time I’m getting and I’m not looking for more. If I get a (power-play) chance, great.”
Not so long ago, it was a big yawnfest when the Arizona Coyotes came to town but this year, the team features a legitimate Calder Trophy candidate in Max Domi as well as Pacific Division All-Star captain John Scott!
Scott has confirmed that he'll participate in Nashville, even though he hasn't had much luck getting into the Coyotes lineup this season. Scott has one assist in 11 games with Arizona and was scratched on Saturday night when his team fell 4-3 to Edmonton in a shootout.
The Coyotes are doing well without their starter Mike Smith, who suffered a lower-body injury in late November. Louis Domingue has been handling the load in net nicely—he's 3-0-2 in his last five starts and will get the nod tonight.
Arizona captain Shane Doan—age 39—scored five goals last week to give him 13 for the year. That's the same total as Jaromir Jagr, who does have more assists, and was good enough to earn Doan the NHL's second star of the week and move him into first place on the franchise's all-time goal list, ahead of Dale Hawerchuk.
Other players to watch tonight include Mikkel Boedker, who's having a career year and leading the Coyotes in scoring with 30 points, and Brad Richardson, who will make his first visit back to Rogers Arena since leaving as a free agent during the summer. Richardson leads the Coyotes in plus-minus with a plus-five and scored his third goal of the season on Saturday in Edmonton.
Defenseman Zbynek Michalek will likely miss the game after suffering an upper-body injury in Edmonton. The
Coyotes website reports that injured centres Martin Hanzal and Boyd Gordon both practiced on Sunday and will probably draw back in tonight. Forward Craig Cunningham was reassigned to the AHL today.
The Canucks will continue their #20in20 series tonight at Rogers Arena with a look back at the "World of Hockey."
A couple of other quick notes before I wrap up for today.
The B.C. Hockey Hall of Fame held a press conference this morning to announce its inductees for 2016:
And, over in Helsinki, the Finns will play for the gold medal on Tuesday after Mikko Rantanen and Kasperi Kapanen each picked up a pair of assists to pace the host team to a 2-1 win over Sweden in the early semifinal.
As I write this, another Arizona Coyotes prospect, Christian Dvorak, opened the scoring for Team USA in their World Junior semifinal, but the Russians have just tied the game 1-1 late in the second period. Quiet game for Canucks prospect Brock Boeser so far.
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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