Saturday February 11 - Boston Bruins 4 - Vancouver Canucks 3
The Vancouver Canucks came close to collecting at least one point on Saturday morning at TD Garden, but David Pastnak beat Ryan Miller with two minutes remaining on the clock in the third period for his 25th goal of the season. That proved to be the game winner in a 4-3 win for the Boston Bruins.
Here are your highlights:
The new line combination of Jannik Hansen with Bo Horvat and Alex Burrows showed promise against the Bruins, as the trio combined to open the scoring just 4:56 into the first period.
Horvat finishes off the nice passing play to put the #Canucks up 1-0
The goal was Horvat's 16th of the year, which ties him with his total from last season. It was also his 100th career point.
The Bruins got stronger as the first period went on, ultimately outshooting the Canucks 16-8 in the opening frame and taking a 2-1 lead into the dressing room thanks to goals by Kevan Miller and, with 38 seconds left in the opening frame, Frank Vatrano's seventh of the year, on the power play.
The Canucks came out with a much better effort in the second, outshooting Boston by an impressive 15-3 margin. They tied the game with six-tenths of a second left on the clock, when Alex Burrows was able to poke the puck past the skate of Bruins' backup goalie Anton Khudobin.
After looking so strong in his shutout against Columbus on Thursday, Ryan Miller did not have a good outing in Boston—particularly on these two third-period goals.
The Canucks regrouped to tie on the power play, when Markus Granlund converted from the slot for his 14th of the year with 5:37 to play. I was starting to believe that Vancouver would leave Boston with at least a point in their pocket for their efforts, then Pastrnak burst my bubble with a nice little shake move that beat Chris Tanev.
As soon as Pastrnak got open, I smelled trouble. His shooting percentage was off the charts early in the year but has come back down to a more normal 14.0 percent, but that's because he now shoots—all the time! Pastrnak is tied with Vladimir Tarasenko for 10th in the NHL with 179 shots taken. He led the Bruins with five shots on Saturday.
My wildly-anticipated Tryamkin vs. Chara showdown didn't amount to much. Nikita finished the night with an uncharacteristically low 12:27 of ice time, which decreased over the course of the game. He was a minus-one—on the ice with Hutton for that third Boston goal—and recorded two hits. Chara, at 39, still led all Bruins with 21:57 of ice time and ended the day with a busy stat line. He didn't factor into any of the scoring but was a plus-one, with two shot attempts, two hits, two takeaways and two blocks.
Elsewhere in the Western Conference, the Stars won, the Preds lost and the Jets lost on both Friday and Saturday, so Vancouver ended the night still six points out of a wild-card spot—officially in 10th place in the West, but tied with Winnipeg and Dallas with 54 points.
Sunday February 12 - Vancouver Canucks at Buffalo Sabres - 4:30 p.m. - Sportsnet Pacific
Vancouver Canucks: 55 GP, 24-25-6, 54 pts, sixth in Pacific Division
Buffalo Sabres: 55 GP, 23-22-10, 56 pts, seventh in Atlantic Division
Back-to-back games on the road are never an easy undertaking, but the Canucks will actually be the more rested team when they hit the ice in Buffalo this afternoon.
The Sabres beat Toronto 3-1 at the ACC on Saturday night, led by two goals from Evander Kane. He generates more press for his misdeeds than he does for his on-ice performance, but Kane's now up to 18 goals for the year, 10 of which have come since the beginning of 2017. That's tops on Buffalo and better than any player on the Canucks.
If you think the playoff race in the West is crazy, the East is absolutely insane. Buffalo currently sits 14th out of 16 teams in the conference. They're just two points out of the cellar—but they're also five points out of a wild-card spot. The standings shift daily in the Eastern Conference and no team is out of the race yet, which makes for a very murky situation with the trade deadline now just two and a half weeks away.
The Sabres have kept themselves in the mix with a 5-4-1 record over their last 10 games. Their power play is something to watch out for—now tops in the league with a 23.8 percent success rate. With power-play goals in their last four straight games, Vancouver is now up to 15.5 percent, but that still puts them just 27th in the league.
I wondered about the wisdom of starting Ryan Miller against the Bruins on Saturday when I figured he'd get the nod today against his old team. Not the case, now...
Coach Desjardins confirms @j_markstrom starts tonight in Buffalo. No other lineup changes expected.
Robin Lehner, who's more than a decade younger than Miller at 25, will take the back-to-back for Buffalo after his strong performance in Toronto last night. He's 2-2 in his last four games—with a sparkling .925 save percentage but a 2.52 goals-against average for the year, going into today's contest.
The only other game on Sunday's schedule that directly affects the Canucks is the Dallas/Nashville matchup, which gets underway at 3 p.m. PT.
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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