Saturday November 5 - Toronto Maple Leafs 6 - Vancouver Canucks 3
Never mind the fact that they gave up six goals. The Vancouver Canucks scored three times for the first time in two weeks—and all heck broke loose as that third puck entered the net.
It was a wild one, with a final total of 171 minutes in penalties. Here are your highlights.
Canucks fans carry deep scars from the darker moments in franchise history. When Daniel Sedin is felled by a hard hit to the head, it's hard not to flash back to the headshot that Duncan Keith laid out in March of 2012, when the Vancouver/Chicago rivalry was at its most heated.
As a reminder, here's how that incident looked, and how Brendan Shanahan—then head of the NHL's Department of Player Safety, now president of the Maple Leafs—explained the five-game suspension that Keith received.
That hit gave Daniel a concussion that not only knocked him out of action for most of the rest of that season—he really wasn't quite right for the next couple of years.
By contrast, the NHL has announced this morning that Nazem Kadri will not face any supplementary discipline for the blindside hit he laid on Daniel with 6:42 to play in the third period last night—as Daniel was releasing the shot that resulted in Vancouver's third goal.
This is a great GIF—you can advance it frame by frame by running your cursor across the video in Twitter, and can start and stop it here by clicking on it. But apparently there wasn't enough video evidence to confirm that Kadri had engaged in a suspendable offense.
Click here as Greg Wyshynski of Yahoo Sports walks us through the league's logic—and informs us that "blindside" hits, in and of themselves, have not been illegal since 2012, when that wording was removed from the NHL rule book.
The good news? Daniel went to the quiet room, but only missed about seven minutes of action. He returned for four shifts in the game's final six minutes or so. He also spoke to the media after the game.
"I think it was pretty clear cut East-West. That's a tough one" - D.Sedin talks about the hit he took Saturday night against the Leafs. pic.twitter.com/97QJGkL8cG
Hopefully he's still feeling OK today. Concussion symptoms can be tricky that way.
The other good news—on a team where restitution for wrongs is sometimes overlooked, Jannik Hansen was fired up when he went after Kadri, despite having been levelled himself by Morgan Rielly just seconds earlier.
According to HockeyFights.com, that's the fifth fight of Hansen's NHL career. His last one was on March 7, 2015, against Brendan Dillon of the San Jose Sharks.
After the Kadri incident, the game devolved into a series of shenanigans. Derek Dorsett fought Leo Komarov; Alex Burrows caught Rielly with his stick, then Ryan Miller endeared himself to Canucks fans like never before when he stepped in to rescue poor Troy Stecher from a potential beatdown by big Matt Martin.
Matt Martin knocks down Stecher, a guy half his size, then proceeds to pummel him. Good job by Miller saving his teammate. #Canuckspic.twitter.com/9LhZH8VMrq
Stecher's a little guy at 5'10" and 190 pounds, but Miller's listed at 6'2" and 168! He's no Ron Hextall but explained after the game why he felt he had to step in.
"I had to jump in. There's no question I'm going to take care of that and help out Stech" - Miller talks about sticking up for his teammate. pic.twitter.com/vIHnYV0lUR
So—that's where we stand for the moment. The Leafs and Canucks will bring the hate to Rogers Arena in four weeks' time, on December 3—and there probably won't be an empty seat in the house as fans show up to see how the revenge gets served from both sides.
Other stuff? Yeah—there's a little bit of other stuff.
The Canucks were already in an early 2-0 hole when Derek Dorsett, of all people, was the player to break the scoring drought, tallying his first of the season at the 16:44 mark of the first period. Dorsett was the Canucks' only real offensive weapon for a good part of the game.
nearing midway mark of 2nd Dorsett remains #Canucks lone forward with a shot on goal tonight. He has 4. D-men with other 6
The other two goals were scored by Henrik and Daniel Sedin.
I wasn't surprised to see the defense take a beating with both Alex Edler and Chris Tanev out of the lineup. Clearly overmatched in a top-pairing role, Erik Gudbranson and Ben Hutton both finished the night at minus-4.
Nikita Tryamkin had a good game. He played more than 20 minutes, finished with a plus-one, got two shots on goal and registered three hits while staying out of the penalty box and avoiding all funny business. He even logged 2:34 on the penalty kill. More, please!
In addition to suffering the indignity of being rescued by his goalie, Troy Stecher didn't shine as brightly without Edler to help cover up his shortcomings. He did pick up his first NHL point—an assist on Daniel's goal—but got just one of his three shot attempts in the game on net, despite 2:38 of power-play time.
Edler remains with the team and took the morning skate on Saturday, so hopefully he'll be back in action soon. The news is not so good for Tanev.
Friedman reports Chris Tanev is headed back to Vancouver. Re-aggravated “what’s believed to be a bone bruise."
The Canucks now make their way to New York City, where they'll take on the Islanders on Monday and the Rangers on Tuesday.
Oh—and the Canucks have now fallen to 29th in the league, ahead only of the Arizona Coyotes. With nine points in 12 games, they're on pace for...61.5 points this season...
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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