With the season on the line, the Canucks bounced in Game 5 against the Flames to bring the series to 3-2. The Canucks face elimination again Saturday, and hopefully Monday, so with that in mind I thought I’d take a deeper look at the series thus far and speculate about what might be ahead of us. 

Here is the save percentage by game for all three goaltenders to have played this series: 

Lack started the series very well in games 1 and 2, but things quickly fell apart for him in games 3 and 4. In the second half of the year, Lack demonstrated that he is capable of being of the of the better starting goaltenders in the league, but it only took three games for Bob Hartley’s strategy of crashing Lack’s crease to get into his head. It’s easy to forget that Lack is only one year removed from his rookie season so patience is warranted, but if he’s going to have a successful playoff career, he’s going to have to learn to keep his cool when the opposition coach decides to throw every talentless sack of meat his way. 

Luckily for the Canucks, it appears Ryan Miller is back to form, posting one of his best performances of the year in what was a must win game 5. If anyone knows how to deal with getting his crease crashed, its Ryan Miller, so I don’t expect the strategy employed against Lack will be quite as effective with him in the crease. Needless to say, if the series is to be extended to a game seven, Miller will have to perform to same level in Calgary on Sunday night, which may be lot to expect considering his playoff sv% of .974 isn’t exactly sustainable. 

Speaking of unsustainable, Jonas Hiller has been excellent for Calgary this series, posting a sv% of .943, which is significantly better than his regular season sv% of .918. What’s is even more impressive is his  sv% from high danger areas of .918 in the playoffs (.845 in regular season), which hasn’t made it easy on the Canucks. 

Clearly the story of the series will come down to which ‘iller’ can maintain their unsustainable numbers the longest. 

The graph below shows the even strength possession and scoring chance differential for the defensemen from both teams: 

Interestingly, but perhaps not surprisingly, every single Flames defender had a better scoring chance differential than CorsiFor%, whereas the reverse was true for all the Canucks defenders. The big advantage for the Canucks, it appears, is the Wideman/Russell pairing, which has been eaten up by the Sedin line, resulting in Wideman and Russell ranking in the bottom quarter for CorsiFor% and scoring chance for % among for all defensemen in the playoffs. 

The Brodie/Engelland pairing has been an interesting one for the Flames. While they haven’t been winning the possession battle, Brodie has been in the top 25% of playoff defensemen points per 60 and leads the league in penalty differential at 3. He’ll be a scary player for the Canucks in the future, especially once they find a more capable defensive partner for him than Deryk Engelland. Also of note, is David Schlemko, who has performed very well after being claimed on waivers by the Flames. 

The Canucks best tandem has been Weber and Hamhuis, which is concerning as the Edler/Tanev combination hasn’t been nearly as good this series as they were in the regular season. That said, if the Tanev and Edler are able to regain their form, the Canucks would have a distinct advantage on defense, which really says something, as they Canucks defense core is far from elite. 

The third pair of Sbisa and Bieksa has performed consistent with how they played in the regular season, which is not good. There has been a lot of talk about the Flames physical play, and I think the most meaningful impact we see from this is the penalty differential for the Canucks third pair, with Bieksa at -2 and Sbisa at -1. Unlike with Lack, you can’t make excuses about Bieksa being inexperienced in the playoffs when it comes to facing playoff pests. I guess we’ll see in the last two games whether he’ll be able to rise above Ferland’s physical play, or help Ferland secure his Ben Eager contract. 

The graph below shows the even strength possession and scoring chance differential for the forwards from both teams: 

Willie Desjardins has taken a lot of heat in the Vancouver market for limiting the Sedin’s ice time in the first three games of the series, and rightfully so. The Sedin’s have absolutely dominated at even strength this series. There is some logic in protecting the Sedins from being overplayed, as John Tortorella did last year, but there’s really no point in trying to stay fresh for June if you can’t make it out of April. As we can see from the table above, there is a significant drop off in production at even strength for the Canucks after the Sedins, so they’ll need to be playing in the >20 minute per game range to get this team through the next two games. 

In terms of the Flames forwards, we see a similar trend with the scoring chance differential exceeding the Corsi% for many forwards, in particular the third line of Jones, Ferland, and Stajan, which has been very effective, especially against the Sbisa/Bieksa pairing for the Canucks. 

The chart below shows even strength points per 60 and Penalty Differential for the forwards from both teams: 

One of the favorite narratives of announcers this series has been the play of 18 year-old Sam Bennett, who’s only 18. Did I tell you he was only 18? Bennett has been impressive in terms of both point production and possession, fairing significantly better than Calder nominee Johnny Gaudreau, Hudler and Monahan, who have been non-factors at even strength. If the series was 3-2 for the Canucks instead of the Flames the narrative in the media would be around the no-show of the Flames first line, but its the Canucks who are trailing, so we’re treated to the CBC panel’s endless fawning over the second-coming of Milan Lucic and 18 year-old Sam Bennett. Such is life. 

Believe it or not, there’s is another young center playing in his first season who is getting it done: Bo Horvat. Horvat, together with Kenins and most recently Derek Dorsett, has been highly effective in what has 3rd line minutes. Kenins has been a bit of a liability in terms of taking penalties with a -2 penalty differential (just like Michael Ferland), but overall has been impressive.

Derek Dorsett has been more effective in the past couple games, with 5 shot in games 4 and 5. Most impressive has been his penalty differential, which is reminiscent of his post-season with the Rangers last year. The Canucks will need to shorten their bench in order to get the Sedins the time they need to be effective, but it shouldn’t come at the expense of ice time for Horvat, Dorsett, and Kenins. 

Four of the 11 goals the Flames have scored this series have come on the power play, despite the Canucks having one of the best penalty kills in the league this year. As we see from above, the Canucks penalty kill has still been very effective in terms of limited shot attempts and scoring chances, but the save percentage has been abysmal. If Miller continues to play the way he did in game 5, the Flames won’t be shooting 28.6% on the power play. 

The Canucks face elimination again on Saturday, and it’s a pretty winnable game assuming the Sedins get the ice time they deserve, and Miller plays to the level he’s capable… But that said, in a 1 game sample, anything can happen.