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Vancouver Canucks Game Review: Radim Vrbata Resurfaces for Win in Minnesota |
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Wednesday November 25 - Vancouver Canucks 3 - Minnesota Wild 2
Radim Vrbata snapped out of his scoring slump and Daniel Sedin's two assists moved him into fourth place in NHL scoring as the Vancouver Canucks eked out a 3-2 win against the team with the best home record in the NHL to kick off their tough four-game road trip.
Here are your highlights:
Full credit to the Canucks for sticking with this game after getting off to a questionable start. They were outshot 13-9 in the first period and the Wild took the early lead on their first power play of the game when a wide-open Thomas Vanek fired the puck from the slot past a diving Alex Edler.
But with 28 seconds to go in the opening frame, the Canucks got a little bit lucky against the flow of the play when Radim Vrbata converted a slick pass from Jared McCann past Devan Dubnyk to send Vancouver into the dressing room in a 1-1 tie—and with a ray of hope in a building that has not been friendly to them over the years.
Full credit to Ryan Miller, as well, for making some big saves in the first to keep the game close.
In the second, the Canucks tightened up defensively, outshooting Minnesota by a margin of 10-5 and taking the lead on their only power play of the game—Vrbata's second of the night and sixth of the season, set up by the twins.
Heading into the third with another tenuous one-goal lead was a less than ideal situation, but the Canucks took advantage of a rare defensive breakdown by the Wild by going up 3-1 when Daniel Sedin fed a sweet long-bomb pass to a wide-open Jannik Hansen, who chips away at his reputation for being terrible on breakaways every time he buries one of these chances.
Hansen's now up to seven goals and 14 points in 23 games—well on track to beat his previous career highs of 16 goals (2011-12 and last season) and 39 points (also 2011-12). This time around, he's making the most of his opportunity on Vancouver's first line and certainly looks like he deserves to stay there for awhile.
It hasn't been an easy ride for Hansen, either. Last night, he limped off the ice in the first period after taking a Yannick Weber shot to the foot, but didn't miss a shift. Last Saturday against Chicago, he took a puck to the head—also from a teammate's shot—but missed just one shift and came back to score Vancouver's second goal before the first period was over.
Hansen also leads all Canucks with a plus-10 rating—just ahead of Dan Hamhuis and Chris Tanev, who are both plus-7. I have a sneaky suspicion that the rumours of Hamhuis' defensive decline have been exaggerated in the early going this season. Not necessarily saying that I want to see the Canucks re-sign him to a big contract but I do think he'll continue to be a solid second-pairing contributor more often than not—especially when he's not being expected to chip in on the power play, which I don't think is a good fit for him.
So here we are at American Thanksgiving, when the NHL playoff picture is said to start to come into focus. The Canucks' position was tenuous heading into Wednesday's game, playing the best home-ice team in the league and sitting just one point ahead of Arizona and two points ahead of Anaheim in the Pacific Division—with those two teams facing each other and thus, guaranteed to add at least two points to their collective totals in one form or another.
With their win, the Canucks hung onto third spot in the Pacific, while the Coyotes beat the Ducks to stay one point behind.
Overall, Vancouver is ranked 17th in the NHL—the very definition of a "bubble team," but the relative weakness of the Pacific Division so far this year means they're clinging by their fingernails to the league's last playoff spot.
Considering the rocky ride they've been on for the past couple of weeks, I'm impressed that the Canucks are keeping pace once again—though I know those of you who are hoping for big trade deadline deals or the higher-caliber draft picks that come with a lower finish are probably cursing this news.
Last year at this time, the Canucks were second in the Pacific—and the Western Conference—with 31 points in 22 games. Interestingly, though they've played one more game this year, their goals-for and goals-against are both identical to their Thanksgiving totals from last season—67 goals scored and 62 surrendered. To me, that's a reminder that even though they've fallen in the standings, this team hasn't really regressed much, if at all, from last year.
I think they'll be in it right to the end.
The Canucks are practicing in Dallas today before taking in the big Cowboys/Panthers game this afternoon, then facing the Western Conference-leading Dallas Stars on Friday.
Looks like Sven Baertschi will be subbing back in for Jake Virtanen on Friday:
My final note for today—a shout out to the Utica Comets for their 7-1 drubbing of the Lehigh Valley Phantoms on Wednesday night. The win was fueled by the team's depth players and blueliners—Alex Biega, Taylor Fedun, Blair Jones, Alex Friesen, Carter Bancks and Wacey Hamilton all had two-point nights.
Through 17 games, the Comets are now 7-8-1-1 in their new home in the North Division of the Eastern Conference. They've won two in a row since snapping a four-game losing streak.
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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