Late last season, the Canucks went on a road trip against the three best teams in the Pacific Division: the San Jose Sharks, Los Angeles Kings, and Anaheim Ducks. The Canucks halted a nine-game losing streak by pulling off unlikely victories over all three.
This led to some mixed feelings from Canucks fans. On the one hand, it’s always nice to beat the California Three. On the other hand, the six points they picked up meant they finished third last, ahead of the Edmonton Oilers, instead of second last. As a result, they lost a chance to draft Jesse Puljujarvi and ended up with Olli Juolevi instead.
So now the Canucks have taken two of three games in California after a trade deadline that seemed to clearly declare that the Canucks don’t expect to make the playoffs. I saw the sentiment on Twitter that these wins over Californian teams would once again cost the team a higher draft pick. Let’s slow down on that a bit: the stretch of games against Californian teams that will cost the team a higher draft pick come at the end of March and beginning of April when they face all three teams again.
In any case, there’s no way the Canucks are going to get anywhere lowest than third last: no one’s catching the Colorado Avalanche, who have a stunning 37 points, while the Canucks are ten points up on the team in second last, the Arizona Coyotes, who have 53 points. Holy crap, the Avalanche are terrible. And they did practically nothing at the trade deadline.
I remembered it could be worse while I watched this game.
- Bachmania! With Jacob Markstrom still injured and Ryan Miller still old, Willie Desjardins turned to the third option: Richard Bachman. In just his second ever start for the Canucks, Bachman was, like a hot dog, awesome. He made 43 saves, made all the more impressive by how tiny he looks in the net. He’s 5’10”, which is pretty much exactly average as human males go, but he looks like Simone Biles standing next to Shaq in comparison to the lanky behemoths we’re used to seeing in net these days.
- Bachman’s performance was truly extraordinary, particularly when you consider he hasn’t played in the NHL since October 30, 2015 and hadn’t played at all in nearly two weeks. Then there’s also that time he spent time-traveling back to the late 70’s to write a series of short novels and befriending Stephen King to get him to publish them. That takes a lot out of a guy!
- I was desperately hoping that Bachman would give the puck away behind the net and then have to sprawl back into the net to make the save, just so I could call it a Bachman Turnover Dive.
- Things went off the rails early for the Canucks when Chris “No Relation” Wagner hit Loui Eriksson late, taking the Son of Erik out of the game. The hit appeared to be knee-on-knee and Eriksson didn’t put any weight on his left leg as he left the ice, which is the type of sign that Albert King would have been born under.
- With Eriksson sidelined, Willie Desjardins set the Line Blender 3000 to liquefy, with seemingly no consistent lines for the rest of the game. Everyone seemed to take a turn on Sven Baertschi and Bo Horvat’s line, from Nikolay Goldobin to Jayson Megna and even Joseph Cramarossa for a shift. Like The Cones of Dunshire, it seemed unnecessarily complicated, but I guess I forgot about the essence of the game: it’s about the cones. Wait, I mean, it’s about scoring more goals than the other team. That.
- And score more goals they did, if only just barely. Bo Horvat was Johnny Canuck on the spot when Jonathan Bernier couldn’t handle a long Ben Hutton wrist shot, whacking the loose puck like a mole into its hole. It was Horvat’s 20th of the season, activating a bonus clause in his contract that paid him $212,500.
- Hutton’s assist may have been a fluke, but he had a legitimately great game, showing the offensive flair and creativity that got fans excited about him in the first place. Later in the first period, he executed a perfect toe-drag to slip past a surprised Sami Vatanen, then drew a penalty driving to the net. He finished with a team-high four shots on goal and blocked three shots at the other end of the ice so that Willie Desjardins wouldn’t bench him.
- That would be a reference to new Canuck Nikolay Goldobin, who scored a beautiful goal on a breakaway against the Los Angeles Kings, only to be summarily benched afterwards, likely because he blew the zone a little early to get said breakaway. He got a little more rope in this game and even some power play time with the Sedins in the absence of Eriksson, finishing with 12:41 in ice time, which was still less than everyone else on the Canucks save Eriksson and Cramarossa. Baby steps.
- You can immediately see why Goldobin is going to have a tough time earning favour with coaches: he’s largely disinterested in backchecking and perfunctory once in the defensive zone. He’s got two options: get engaged defensively or get so good at offence that he’s impossible to bench. Honestly, I’ll be happy with either, but the latter is a lot more fun to watch.
- Not long after the Canucks opened the scoring, it looked like Ondrej Kase tied things up, but the refs were immediately on the kase: they kracked the kase and kancelled the goal for a distinct cicking motion.
- Markus Granlund gave the Canucks a 2-0 lead by keeping things simple on a 3-on-1: he just shot it. No passing, no chances for someone to mishandle the puck or for the defence to disrupt the play: just a quick shot that went through the legs like Nate Robinson.
- The Canucks had good chances to extend the lead, but like a ropeless hangman, they couldn’t execute: Hutton sent Megna in on a breakaway, but he got taken down for a penalty. Goldobin and Daniel Sedin passed well on a 2-on-1, but Goldobin was robbed by Bernier. Henrik beat Bernier early in the third, but Kevin Bieksa swept the puck out of the crease before it could roll in. Then late in the game Megna got another partial break, but hit the post.
- The Ducks pulled within one midway through the third. Ryan Getzlaf sent a long cross-ice pass to Patrick Eaves that got tipped, but still made it through. Eaves immediately made like a gassy stoner and ripped it high.
- That was as close as the Ducks would get, though, like the Henderson’s lives, things got a little Harry. Er, hairy. Brendan Gaunce put the Ducks on the power play late when he tripped Corey Perry, which is an egregious error; if you’re going to take a penalty on Perry, at least crosscheck him. Come on!
- Gaunce’s mistake apparently didn’t hurt his reputation in Desjardins’ eyes, as he ended up on the ice in the final minute to defend the Canucks’ one-goal lead. Gaunce has gone a bit under the radar, but he’s played very well defensively, so, as Star-Lord well knows, it’s nice to be recognized.
