1 post tagged “canucks vs senators”
When Bryan Murray called Vancouver Canucks the "New Jersey of the West", with our seemingly "trap" style of play, I thought to myself how ironic it would be if Alain Vigneault responds by employing that play just to spite Murray.
With a 2-0 lead coming into the 3rd period, he did just that, as we hung on by passing the puck around slowly in our own zone, instead of just dumping it in the Senators zone all the time.
For a while, we controlled 3rd period play by doing just this until the Senators picked it up in the late stages of the 3rd, especially after Daniel Alfredsson scored on the 4-on-4. It didn't help that the Canucks got themselves into late penalty trouble after Alfie cut the lead in half, with Josh Green being called for hooking, while Matt Cooke put us 2 men down by crosschecking Alfredsson on open ice.
Thankfully, our penalty kill was great, and most especially our goaltender. They kicked it up a notch when the Sens went on 5-on-3 and didn't really allow them to have many chances to shoot. Ryan Kesler and Mattias Ohlund are such workhorses on the penalty kill this time, I can't imagine what we'd do without those 2, not to mention Roberto Luongo.
Anyway, I didn't get to watch the first period, as I was on the bus on the way home, but I was listening to it on my small radio, even though the signal was a bit fucked up at times. From what I gathered, other than the early penalty by Naslund and that penalty by Bulis that caused him to be demoted to the 4th line, the Canucks played well, especially when killing off those penalties.
I arrived home in time just for the 2nd period to start and was very happy to see us dominate the 2nd period, especially when we got rewarded with 2 goals at that time! I still think we can do better on the 3rd period, although I don't think it's more of the Canucks slacking off, but just at that point we don't want to sacrifice the game just so we can continue forechecking.
- Willie Mitchell played the first period, but left in the 2nd period as, I assume, he aggravated his groin injury again. Really sad this has to happen in this road trip as I know we'll need him on defense, but at least this injury came just right before the All Star Break so he has ample time to heal.
- Taylor Pyatt is hot! And no, I'm not talking about his looks, but his recent mini goal/point streak. 1 goal against Minnesota, 1 goal against Toronto, and now 1 goal against Ottawa, albeit the goal he scored tonight was a bit lucky as it deflected off his skate. He just had a strong evening tonight, similar to his game in Toronto, as both games had him playing with an injury to the thumb. For a guy with this injury, he sure forechecked hard, won puck battles, were able to force turnovers.
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Rory Fitzpatrick scores his first goal this season as a direct result of Taylor Pyatt's play. The goal wasn't pretty, the type where you know the goalie should have had that one as Fitz just lobbed the puck towards the goal and boom, it's in. No deflection, no tip in, just a straight out shot.
- I swear I had more to say here, but I'm already falling asleep.
- Vancouver Canucks are the only team without an empty net goal. SHOCKING!
Tomorrow is the last day of this Northeast Division road trip. The next stop is the top league in the East: Buffalo Sabres. I just want them to play the full 60 minutes. I'll be watching the game from T.G.I. Fridays with my brother. :D
