“Hockey is fun again in Vancouver. This is the way it’s supposed to be.”
Luongo summed up what’s been a rejuvenating season in Vancouver. And what a fitting outcome on Luongo’s Ring of Honour night. Demko stopped all 36 shots, Kuzy got his second in as many games, Joshua got two including an early Christmas gift, and Boes potted his 22nd of the season for the Canucks’ 4th win in a row. Here are your highlights:
The Canucks turned in another solid game, especially the first two before sitting back a bit more in the third. The team has won 20 through 30 games, which bests the previous mark of 20 wins in 31 games set in 92-23. Not too shabby of a season out of the gates! The Canucks forecheck was on their mark all game, though Tocchet still sees room for improvement all around.
“The third, we were, I think we were just kind of throwing pucks out just trying to eat the clock,” he said. “I think we can still learn. I think our breakouts in third, we weren’t really connected and we were throwing a lot of pucks away, so those are things we got to just learn. But for the most part, 4-0, you know, you are pretty happy. Like I said, that’s a really good hockey team over there.”
Tocchet spread the ice time around a bit more this game too, with Miller dipping to his second-lowest TOI for the season and the Hughes-Hronek pairing dipping below 20 minutes. (Oddly enough, the only 20+ minute players were the Zadorov-Myers pairing… must be an outlier game for the Chaos-to-Winning equation.)
When asked about the ice time, Tocc talked about his depth players stepping up: “The last three, four games I just think that some guys are playing well. I think those guys got to play a little bit more and if that means you got to take a little bit more off your stars, so be it.
“And we got a four game road trip in six days. There wasn’t a lot of mileage on some of those guys, so that’s gonna really help us.”
After their up-and-down couple weeks that culminated in their 4-1 homestand, the Canucks head out for back-to-back matinees this weekend. They’ll be riding on some strong performances, hoping to carry that trend forward. Myers talked about that turnaround after playing .500 hockey:
“We were talking about this through that tough stretch. We were on a little bit of a slide. We were still getting a few wins, but we knew we weren't playing the game that we wanted to play. We weren't doing the little things that gave us a lot of success at the start of the season.
“We talked through it a lot, went through a lot of video, talked about it within the group and with the coaches, and we got back to a good place. But there's always room for improvement. We want to try and keep getting better as a group, and keep looking for that top level.”
They’ll see what they can do tomorrow against the Wild in the afternoon.
Extra controversial note: I fully support Luongo’s support of the support for freeing the skate jersey. In his pre-game address, Luongo told the crowd: “And the last thing I’ll say is let’s free the skate jersey.” Best jersey ever.
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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