Monday March 7 - Vancouver Canucks at Los Angeles Kings - 7:30 p.m. - Sportsnet Pacific, TSN1040
Vancouver Canucks: 64 GP, 25-27-12, 62 pts, fourth in Pacific Division
Los Angeles Kings: 64 GP, 38-22-4, 80 pts, second in Pacific Division
It's a quiet Monday morning in Canuck-land as the team prepares to face the Los Angeles Kings tonight at Staples Center.
Somewhat counterintuitively, it's the Canucks who are looking to build off their gritty win on Saturday in San Jose, while the Kings are licking their wounds after being knocked down to second place in the Pacific Division following a 3-2 loss to the Anaheim Ducks in a ferocious game that was highlighted by a first-period line brawl.
The Canucks lost two players in Saturday's game, though. Henrik Sedin has come back to Vancouver for further evaluation of the injury he suffered in the first period, while Chris Tanev is still with the team but was projected to be "doubtful" after leaving the Sharks game in the third period. The Canucks' website lists both Henrik and Tanev's injuries as "upper body."
At last, some line combinations!
Linden Vey started Saturday's game on right wing with Brendan Gaunce and Bo Horvat, then shifted to a first-line centre role after Henrik was injured. He did a good job, though he'll have a tough assignment tonight whether he's lining up against Anze Kopitar or Jeff Carter. After being sidelined for two weeks with a groin injury, Radim Vrbata slots back in, while Yannick Weber gets the nod on defence.
For the Kings, new acquisition Kris Versteeg was knocked out of Saturday's game after taking a pounding from Rickard Rakell in the line brawl. Versteeg practiced on Sunday and will probably play tonight. The Kings will be without Marian Gaborik, who's sidelined with a knee injury, as well as Jordan Nolan and Matt Greene.
After such an emotional game on Saturday, I could imagine the Kings coming out flat tonight against a lesser team. Still, they'll know they need to get as many points as possible if they want a crack at first place in the division and what should be an easier division-crossover matchup in the first round—at this point, most likely against the Nashville Predators.
The Kings will be honouring Jimmy Carson on Monday as part of their Legends Night series. Carson did two tours of duty in L.A.—most notably scoring 55 goals in his sophomore season in 1987-88 before being included as the linchpin of the Wayne Gretzky trade.
Carson was also a Vancouver Canuck for half a season. He was acquired from the Kings in January of 1994 in exchange for Dixon Ward and a conditional draft pick and scored 17 points in 34 regular-season games, but only got into two games during the famous 1994 playoff run, recording a single assist.
Tonight's game will be another opportunity for Canucks fans and management to take a look at big Milan Lucic, the local boy who's scheduled to become an unrestricted free agent this summer and who might be the apple of Jim Benning's eye when it comes to improving his team in the offseason.
Over the weekend, I came across
this article from Fluto Shinzawa at the
Boston Globe, musing on Lucic's future.
"The ex-Bruin would not be entering a good situation in Vancouver," suggests Shinzawa. "The Canucks are caught in a bad spot — not strong enough to make the playoffs, and not weak enough to finish with a bottom-three record...
"While Lucic would have to take far less money with the Kings, he’s in a far better position in Los Angeles. The Kings are set up for multiple seasons. Lucic likes living in Manhattan Beach, Calif. There aren’t many places where the grass is greener than in LA, in figurative and literal translations."
The Kings will be tight to the cap again this summer, but they have a knack of finding ways to keep players that they want to stick around. I think Lucic and the Kings will need to have a good playoff run before Dean Lombardi decides whether or not to dig into his bag of tricks this summer.
I'm pondering a chance in allegiance for salary-cap information from my old standby,
General Fanager over to a new site I've only seen recently,
CapFriendly. This is primarily due to how they handle long-term injured reserve cap space, showing it clearly in teams' main totals on the home page.
Alex Edler was moved to LTIR alongside Brandon Sutter over the weekend, so CapFriendly is now showing the Canucks to have well over $7 million in available cap space thanks to that injury relief—way more than enough to bring in Nikita Tryamkin. Considering all the big injuries the Canucks have had this year, this number makes far more sense to me, intuitively, than the $2 million that General Fanager is showing.
I'll keep monitoring both sites for awhile, but I think CapFriendly.com is worth a bookmark if you haven't done so already.
So—that brings us to the big Russian defenceman.
If you missed it on Sunday, here's the latest from Russia on Tryamkin.
With any luck, the big guy will be in Vancouver before too long. Even better, if Tanev's likely to miss any amount of time with his injury.
Enjoy the game!
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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