Stick-taps and glove-drops is a recurring feature after every Canucks game giving some quick kudos and criticism before the longer I Watched This Game feature. That’s right: two post-game articles for the price of one! That price is still zero dollars.
Brock Boeser got the headlines, but Jacob Markstrom deserves the first stick-tap. The Canucks gave up 16 shots in each of the first two periods and it was Markstrom’s 31 saves that gave the Canucks a chance to get and keep the lead heading into the third.
Daniel Sedin gets a stick-tap for his pretty move on the breakaway to tie up the game after the Flyers went up by one. Daniel deked to the forehand and put the puck off the post, off Neuvirth’s pad, and in. I choose to believe it was intentional.
A tap of the stick to Brock Boeser, who sometimes seems too good to be true. He scored his eighth and ninth goals of the season, both of them clear demonstrations of his wicked release. His first goal came at even-strength off a long pass by Derrick Pouliot and the second came off a power play set up courtesy of both Sedins. Boeser is up to nine goals on the season.
Boeser pots his second of the game - just casually picks the corner on the PP#Canucks up 3-1 pic.twitter.com/t5Anb6G9lJ
— Ryan Biech (@ryanbiech) November 22, 2017
A tap of the stick to Derrick Pouliot for that nice pass to Boeser to set up his first goal. Pouliot made a couple nice defensive plays in this game, but that pass shows his true strength: moving the puck.
Boeser snaps it past Neuvirth - nice shot#Canucks up 2-1 pic.twitter.com/CsEYsoIPzQ
— Ryan Biech (@ryanbiech) November 22, 2017
Loui Eriksson gets a tap of the stick for another two-point night. He picked up a rebound on the power play and poked it across to Sven Baertschi at the backdoor to put the Canucks up 4-1 in the second period.
A tap of the stick to Sam Gagner, who had a chance to score into the empty net, but instead passed it to Eriksson to get his first goal of the season. You just hope for some good karma for Gagner to follow after that, considering he’s been snakebit himself.
Tap of the stick to Brendan Gaunce, who had a game-high six shots on goal, but just couldn’t find the back of the net. Poor guy hasn’t scored a goal since the second game of his career, way back on October 30, 2015, but he was good in this game and just couldn’t get a bounce to go his way.
Dropping the gloves with Michael Del Zotto and Alex Biega, who got run over by the Flyers in this game. The Flyers out-shot the Canucks 13-2 with Biega on the ice at 5-on-5 and it was even worse when you look at shot attempts instead of shots on goal, 28-5 for the Flyers with Biega on at 5-on-5.
Meanwhile, Ben Hutton and Erik Gudbranson get stick-taps for holding their own in tough minutes against the line of Claude Giroux, Sean Coutourier, and Jakub Voracek. They played over 12 minutes against that line at 5-on-5 and, though Voracek came up with a goal, Hutton and Gudbranson played well against them. Overall, the Canucks out-shot the Flyers 18-10 when Gudbranson was on the ice at 5-on-5.
