CanucksArmy Post Game: Running Wild
6 years ago
Puck Drop
Friday night’s matchup with the Minnesota Wild got off to an explosive start at both ends of the ice. The Canucks struck first, lighting the lamp just 53 seconds into the game.
After gaining the offensive zone, Bo Horvat button-hooked and passed cross-ice to Michael Del Zotto. Del Zotto came down the left side; his initial shot was stopped. But Del Zotto followed up the play, picking up his rebound and circling behind the net. From there Del Zotto was able to hook the puck enough on a wraparound to beat Devan Dubnyk to open the scoring.
Less than a minute later, it was the Wilds turn to get on the board. After Jake Virtanen did a bit of a fly by on Zach Parise, Parise put a sharp angle shot up and over Anders Nilsson. Tho the play in the corner by Jake wasn’t great, this ultimately is a failure by Nilsson. It’s yet another bad goal early in a game, this time erasing a strong start that had Vancouver up early.
After giving up a bad one, the hockey gods appeared to make it up to Nilsson with six minutes left. Charlie Coyle took a nice pass through the crease and found himself standing at the post with the entire net open for business. Someone the only thing Coyle managed to hit, was Anders Nilsson sitting about a foot outside the crease.
The tough breaks went both ways tho, as the Canucks appeared to take a two-one lead with just over three minutes left in the period. Alas, the goal was immediately and emphatically waived off due to being kicked in by Gagner. The play was reviewed, but the call on the ice held up, and it’s hard to take umbrage with it. The puck was likely going in off just the deflection, but Gagner’s foot clearly moves forward in a motion that appears to propel the puck.
The period would end tied up at one goal apiece.
2nd Period
The early period goals carried over into the second. Less than three minutes in, Minnesota took their first lead of the night.
After another iffy defensive play by Virtanen, Tyler Ennis made a nice pass to set up Matt Cullen. Cullen made a nice move to pull the puck around Nilsson, putting the Wild up two-to-one.
Through two periods it was an eventful night for Virtanen, for a variety of reasons. Despite the defensive question marks, Virtanen was also involved at the other end of the ice.
Four minutes after scoring Cullen nearly put his team up by a pair. As the Wild moved the puck around in the Vancouver zone, it wound up on Cullen’s stick to the left of Nilsson. Cullen centred the puck to Charlie Coyle who fed it right back to Cullen. Cullen fired, but Nilsson came across, stretching out to rob Cullen of his second goal of the game.
On the heels of Nilsson’s big save, the Canucks rallied to tie the game at two just over a minute later. It was Jussi Jokinen who buried the rebound after Erik Gudbranson made a nice play to set up a shot and rebound situation. Coming down the right wing, Gudbranson shot low and hard on Dubnyk’s far side, forcing Dubnyk to blocker the puck away. Jokinen was there ready to pounce, scoring in back to back games.
The teams then exchanged penalties thought the middle part of the period, the next goal came with just 4:22 left in the second.
Troy Stecher got caught out of position allowing Eric Staal to set up at the edge of Nilsson’s crease. Stecher hustled to get back and tie up Staal, but it was too late. The pass came, appeared to go off Stecher’s foot/leg and get a piece of Staal’s stick before heading to the back of the net.
3-2 Minny, headed to the third.
3rd Period
The third period…. happened. Tho for much of it you wouldn’t know it. Eight minutes into the final frame the shots were 3-2 Minnesota. The highlight from a Vancouver perspective was a Derrick Pouliot chance, shooting off the faceoff Pouliot trickled the puck through Dubnyk. Hitting the post, just prior to Matt Dumba pulling the puck out of the crease.
Just before that, a Troy Stecher spin-o-rama set up a rebound chance for Nic Dowd, but outside of that, the Canucks didn’t offer up much push back in the third.
The Wild added a pair of late goals to put the game to bed, securing a 5-2 victory.
The Numbers
- The Canucks had 43.06% of the expected goals at 5v5
- Minnesota put 14 high danger shots on Nilsson, compared to Vancouver’s 7.
- Despite saving just 88.6% of shots, Anders Nilsson’s save percentage was actually 1.2% higher than expected, an indicator of the number of quality chances he faced.
Quick Hits
- After coming to life physically with 11 hits in the last two games, Jake Virtanen was hitless on the night. It’s no coincidence this resulted in him being moved down the line up early in the game. Hits aren’t a stat that is generally useful in player evaluation, but as I said last game, for Virtanen it’s a sign, he’s engaged and playing at the right end of the ice. It’s also something Travis Green desperately wants out of Virtanen, as the Canucks, on the whole, have been a rather soft team for several years now.
- Early in the third Travis Green juggled his lines, bumping Reid Boucher and Jake Virtanen up to Horvat’s line. Given how lacklustre the period was for Vancouver, I doubt we’ll see much more of that combination.
- Life without Boeser is becoming a cruel mistress rather quickly. The Canucks look like a team that’s well aware of the uphill climb it faces just to be competitive without their star rookie. The silver lining is, of course, the draft lottery, but that is little comfort to competitive athletes facing the grind of consistently losing.
