For the second time this pre-season, the Canucks lost 3-2 to the Sharks in overtime. The biggest difference this time: we got to see it happen.
Weirdly, seeing this game makes me doubt the first one even happened. What, we’re supposed to believe that the exact same game happened twice? And that the first game was just conveniently untelevised. Tell the truth, people: you just paid off John Shorthouse to fake the play-by-play and went out to The Boiling Crab for some sweet potato fries and shrimp.
Does this conspiracy theory make any sense whatsoever? Of course not. Does it require some sort of weird time travel where the Canucks and Sharks played this game, then went back in time? Yeah, I guess it does. Is this a weird intro? Indeed. But it’s pre-season for hockey writers too. I watched this game.
- Markus Granlund may have had a strong game between Anton Rodin and Sven Baertschi on Friday, but if you thought he would start the season at centre between those two wingers, Bo Horvat immediately disabused you of that notion. The RoBoBear line was easily the Canucks best: the Canucks out-shot the Sharks 12-2 at even-strength with Rodin on the ice.
- Andrey Pedan had a great game, which makes it such a shame that he missed almost the entire first period after getting an instigator minor, a 5-minute major for fighting, and a 10-minute misconduct for fighting Dan Kelly after the second-best rapper from Degrassi made a big hit on Chris Tanev. I’m not opposed to him defending Tanev at all, but he played so well in the rest of the game that it was a shame he missed a full 17 minutes of it.
- The instigator penalty didn’t hurt the Canucks at all, as they opened the scoring shorthanded. Joe LaBate picked up a loose puck in the defensive zone and skated it up ice on a 3-on-2 with Troy Stecher and Tuomo Ruutu. LaBate’s cross-ice pass to Ruutu was perfectly placed, as was Ruutu’s wrist shot, firing it top shelf where Grandma keeps the Christmas decorations.
- Beyond the goal, Tuomo Ruutu had a strong game, making an argument for a fourth-line role with a game-high 7 hits, 3 blocked shots, and a strong possession game at even-strength. The Canucks have always loved lesser brothers—Fedor Fedorov, Steve Kariya, Markus Granlund, Daniel Sedin—and they already had the lesser Ruutu: Jarkko. Signing Tuomo Ruutu now that he’s worse than Jarkko weirdly makes a whole lot of sense for the Canucks.
- Troy Stecher had a much quieter game than his 3-point Rogers Arena debut, but he was still impressive, driving the centre lane on Ruutu’s goal, whipping out a Savardian spin-o-rama, making a few decent defensive plays, and even throwing a solid hip check on Melker Karlsson. Given the other defencemen battling for spots, I still don’t think he’ll make the Canucks opening day roster; give me a similar performance while playing with Luca Sbisa rather than Alex Edler, however, and I’ll be sold.
- The Canucks’ second goal was a beauty. Olli Juolevi stepped around Tommy Wingels with what would have been a highlight-reel move if the puck hadn’t hit Wingels’ skate. He recovered, however, and tipped the puck down to Bo Horvat, who sent it back between his legs to Anton Rodin, who went down on one knee and proposed a goal to the net. She said yes!
- Seriously, that Horvat pass was sick, nasty, gross, and disgusting. That pass was so filthy the CDC sent out a travel advisory for Vancouver in case it caused an outbreak.
- You can see Juolevi’s potential with his assist and a few other nice plays in this game, but he’s still pretty green. On occasion, he would turn the puck over in the defensive zone, then sit on a log in a swamp and sing a song while playing the banjo. You can get away with that in Junior, but not in the NHL.
- With Joe LaBate adding a nice assist to his pretty goal and strong physical play, I wonder if a guy like Derek Dorsett might feel threatened. Is that why he fought Alex Gallant? There didn’t seem to be much reason for the two of them to fight otherwise, unless they were trying to make an elaborate “Goofus and Gallant” reference. Goofus rubs shoulders with rookies. Gallant turns and talks to them face-to-face like a normal human being.
