3 areas where the Canucks were improved in Game 1 vs. the Flames

Photo Credit: Sergei Belski/USA TODAY Sports

The Canucks’ new look for the new season was triggered in large part by the shortcomings they showed during their six-game playoff loss to the Calgary Flames last April. What better way for Jim Benning to assess his offseason changes than to open the new year with two head-to-head looks at his Canucks against the team that ended their season last spring?

On Wednesday night, the Canucks passed their first test with flying colours, kicking off 2015-16 with a 5-1 win over the Flames. Were the Canucks that good, or was Calgary bad?

“We played a game that is totally out of character for us and we got what we deserved, they kicked our butt,” Calgary coach Bob Hartley told Darren Haynes of the Canadian Press after the game, via The Province.

The Flames will get a chance to redeem themselves when the two teams meet again at Rogers Arena on Saturday night. Based on our one-game sample size, here’s what Vancouver changed for the better on Wednesday.

When Jim Benning was assistant general manager of the Boston Bruins in 2011, the team won the Stanley cup—against the Canucks—playing a gritty style anchored by their “Merlot Line” of Shawn Thornton, Gregory Campbell and Daniel Paille.

Swimming against today’s hockey tides, Benning has assembled a similarly tough group in his second year at the helm in Vancouver, starting the season with a fourth line of Brandon Prust, Adam Cracknell and Derek Dorsett.

On Wednesday, Prust and Dorsett both got their first fights of the year out of the way and took early leads in the penalty-minute standings, with 15 apiece.

Dorsett told Iain MacIntyre of the Vancouver Sun that he “wanted to make it clear that we were going to give him some pushback” when he engaged Micheal Ferland just two seconds into the first period.

Ferland was the thorn in the side of the Canucks during the playoffs—hitting everything that moved, then rubbing salt in the wound with a three-point performance in the series’ deciding Game 6. 

He handled himself well against Dorsett and led the Flames with six hits on Wednesday night, but finished the night at minus-one and wasn’t an impact player. Mission accomplished.

The shots on goal favoured Calgary 6-3 when Prust tangled with big Brandon Bollig later in the first—a scrap that seemed to come out of nowhere, but did shift the momentum in Vancouver’s direction. After the fight, the Canucks outshot Calgary 12-3 in the rest of the first period, went to the dressing room with a 2-0 lead and kept the upper hand for the rest of the night.

In Game 1, new defencemen Ben Hutton and Matt Bartkowski delivered exactly as hoped, clearing the zone quickly and effectively with sharp outlet passes or calmly skating the puck up the ice.

It was a welcome sight after the number of times we saw the Vancouver defence cough up the puck in its own zone under pressure from the aggressive Calgary forecheck during last year’s playoffs.

Rookie Hutton got burned by the Flames’ top line when he got caught out of position on Calgary’s only goal, but was otherwise solid in his 17:03 of ice time. He threaded a gorgeous pass through to Jannik Hansen to pick up his first NHL point on the game’s opening goal and created some much-needed energy with his dynamic quarterbacking of the second power-play unit.

Bartkowski had a hit-and-miss preseason but looked poised on Wednesday, showing a strong skating stride and impressive puck sense to go along with his good size. He looks bigger on the ice than advertised at 6’1″ and 196 pounds.

A healthy scratch on Wednesday, Yannick Weber was a team-worst minus-five for the Canucks against the Flames during last year’s playoffs, while the now-traded Kevin Bieksa was minus-one. First impressions would indicate that the new arrivals have been successful at improving the Vancouver blue line.

During the playoffs, Daniel and Henrik Sedin managed just four points in six games against Calgary. In four 2014-15 regular-season games, Henrik had three goals—on just three shots—while Daniel had two goals and an assist on nine shots.

Wednesday night’s offensive outburst from the twins was a breath of fresh air against the improving Flames. Henrik beat his regular-season total from all of last year with four shots, one of which got past Karri Ramo, while Daniel tallied two goals and an assist on a team-high seven shots. New winger Brandon Sutter came along for the ride with a two-point night and three shots on goal.

When the twins are lighting the lamp, the Canucks don’t lose very many hockey games. To see them sizzle against Calgary is a tremendous sign of good things to come for the year ahead.

With so many positives emerging from Wednesday’s game, the question now is whether this will turn into a pattern or if the outcome was a one-game anomaly.

After the game, Flames defenceman Kris Russell was quick to point out all the areas where Calgary went wrong:

“We were poor in our own zone, our transition game wasn’t there, I thought our neutral zone wasn’t good at all, we had a lot of turnovers, our forechecking never really got going, we never really made it hard for (Ryan) Miller and we gave them too much room,” listed Russell to Haynes.

Like Vancouver, the Flames surprised by making the playoffs last season when they were projected to be among the league’s bottom feeders. 

After their playoff success and high-profile offseason acquisitions of Dougie Hamilton and Michael Frolik, Calgary’s not flying under the radar anymore.

The Canucks remain blissfully free from the pressure of outside expectations, which may have helped them surprise the Flames on Wednesday.

On Saturday, we’ll see whether the positive signs hold up or if the Flames are able to push back.