Monday March 7 - Los Angeles Kings 5 - Vancouver Canucks 1
Monday night was a tale of two games for the Vancouver Canucks. For the first 30 minutes, the visitors skated with the Los Angeles Kings, matched their physical game and even scored the first goal. Then, the Kings got rolling—collecting five goals and dominating the Canucks to earn a convincing win and try to keep pace with the Anaheim Ducks at the top of the Pacific Division.
Here are your highlights:
With Henrik Sedin and Chris Tanev added to the injured list alongside Hansen, Sutter and Edler, Daniel Sedin is now the only member of the Canucks' usual Starting Five who's still standing. That's a pretty serious blow for a team that's not exactly known for its depth.
Before these latest injuries, the Canucks were a middle-of-the-pack team in terms of the number of man-games lost to injury. But their big bubble on this chart—based on data up to last weekend—shows that they're among the league's top five in terms of the impact of their missing players through the season.
— Man-Games Lost NHL (@ManGamesLostNHL) March 5, 2016
If there's a silver lining from this data, perhaps we can enjoy the idea that Calgary and Winnipeg have been relatively healthy this year, but still sit below Vancouver in the league standings?
Anyway—with a first line of Daniel-Vey-Etem and a top defensive pairing of Hamhuis-Weber, it wasn't hard to predict a rough outing for the Canucks against the Kings on Monday.
The best moment came when Hamhuis scored for the second straight game—giving Vancouver a short-lived 1-0 lead in the second period after a superb pass from Linden Vey.
Jake Virtanen also had a solid physical game, standing up to the perpetually-grumpy Drew Doughty—though it would have been nice if Virtanen had been able to rub Doughty out on this play *before* he got off the shot that would tie the game 1-1.
Far left - Doughty was probably mad at Virtanen because Virtanen cross checks him high, which sends him down pic.twitter.com/iJeGxdycil
According to the stat sheet, Vancouver out-hit L.A. 28-25 on Monday, with Luca Sbisa leading the way with four hits. Virtanen got credit for two shots, four missed shots, and no hits. Go figure.
After going 3-for-7 on the power play against San Jose last Saturday, the Canucks got another five tries on Monday as they Kings took a steady stream of penalties. But after looking so good on Saturday, they didn't even get any meaningful pressure this time around. Anze Kopitar scored the only power-play goal of the night—which proved to be the game-winner—while Alex Burrows was in the penalty box for tripping Brayden McNabb less than a minute after Doughty had tied the game.
The shot differential in the third period was only 8-6 for L.A., but it felt much worse. Ryan Miller let in two terrible goals. Jeff Carter's snipe off the rush could be forgiven, but Vincent Lecavalier's dribbler through the pads was downright embarrassing.
Down 4-1, Willie pulled his goalie with five minutes left in the third period—a desperation play I'd rather see him make when the Canucks are behind by one goal and might actually be able to salvage a point or two with the extra man. You know the rest—Matt Bartkowski attempted a pass up the middle that was easily intercepted, giving Carter his second of the night and sending the Kings to the dressing room with an easy 5-1 victory.
The Canucks now return to Vancouver after their 1-1 road trip to get ready for an important #TankNation game against the Arizona Coyotes on Wednesday. The Canucks did drop a spot in the standings on Monday—they're now 24th thanks to a Buffalo win over Toronto—but Vancouver and Arizona have been in lockstep for the better part of a month and are currently tied with 62 points.
Something will have to give on Wednesday. Will we hear Canucks fans at Rogers Arena actively cheering for a loss?
To wrap up today, a couple of quick player personnel notes:
First—an update on Nikita Tryamkin:
Linden says no road blocks with Tryamkin so far. NHL must OK KHL release first. Could sign + arrive as early as this week. #Canucks
Finally, the Canucks completed a minor-league move, sending Dane Fox to the Carolina Hurricanes for future considerations.
Fox was signed as an overage undrafted free agent by Mike Gillis in December of 2013, while he was in the midst of putting up a 64-43-107 season while playing with Connor McDavid on the Erie Otters. As Canucks property, he has spent the better part of the last two seasons in the ECHL, where he has put up decent numbers—26-24-50 in 53 games this season with the Kalamazoo Wings.
Fox showed a bit of a feisty side when he appeared with the Canucks at their YoungStars tournaments and training camps, but I always considered him a very long shot to make it to the NHL.
If you're wondering how this trade could be completed after the deadline:
Trades can still happen. But players involved can not play in the playoffs. https://t.co/XfPXzRYnEK
According to this article from Nicholas Niedzielski at the AHL Charlotte Checkers' website, Monday was the AHL's trade/loan deadline.
Fox will be assigned to the Checkers, who also completed a one-for-one loan with the Utica Comets on Monday. That saw Blair Jones head to Charlotte in exchange for 30-year-old T.J. Hensick. Originally a third-round draft pick by the Colorado Avalanche in 2005, Hensick has 112 games of NHL experience on his resume and has put up some good numbers in the AHL, with five 60-plus point seasons. He's 7-18-25 this year in 46 games.
Hensick is a playmaking centre, something the Comets believe they need for their playoff run. After a 7-2-1 run in the last 10 games, Utica is currently tucked comfortably into third place in the North Division, so their postseason chances look good.
@JRyczek I’ll ask you this: would you have traded Blair Jones for Cal O’Reilly? Because that’s the type of player the Comets got in Hensick.
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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