Canucks Ground Jets 3-2 in Entertaining Game at Rogers Arena

By the way – Trevor – don’t quit your day job. Based on tonight, I don’t think broadcasting is in your future!

Leigh Ramsden lives in Vancouver and is an avid Canucks fan, having been a partial season ticket holder for over 10 years. He's old enough to have witnessed all three Stanley Cup losses, as such, his prime goal is to remove those scars by seeing a Cup brought to Vancouver. Leigh is Fighting For Stanley's (www.fightingforstanley.ca/vancouver) west coast correspondent, and will also blog after all Canuck games for The Nelson Daily.

In one of the most entertaining games in recent memory, the Vancouver Canucks defeated the Winnipeg Jets on Thursday night at Rogers Arena, winning 3-2.  The Canucks and Jets traded chances throughout the game and threw a ton of shots at each other, entertaining the crowd.

Coach Alain Vigneault reunited the American Express line of Kesler-Higgins-Booth on this night, and the move paid off in spades as the three Americans gave the Jets fits all night long.

The Canucks came out like gangbusters in the first period, using an early power play to pepper Winnipeg goaltender Andrei Pavelec with 10 shots halfway through.  The Canucks continued this trend for the rest of the opening frame, finishing with 20 shots to Winnipeg’s 11.  Although they were dominant territorially, they were unable to solve Pavelec, who swallowed up pucks and didn’t give many rebounds.

Ryan Kesler scored shorthanded early in the second period to give the Canucks a 1-0 lead. Vancouver handed the Jets three power plays in the second, however, they were able to kill them all and still take the game to Winnipeg when they were at even strength. 

In a nice change, the Canucks were able to draw a number of penalties on this night, but the officials unfortunately didn’t respond. 

Ex-Canuck Kyle Wellwood drew the Jets even at 15:22 of the second, getting free from Alex Edler in front of the net and sliding the puck past Canuck netminder Cory Schneider.

In the early part of the third period, the Jets came out like a house on fire, taking the game to the hosts. They were rewarded three minutes into the period, as Blake Wheeler took advantage of another Edler gaffe by skating around the fallen defenseman and beating Schneider on the short side. 

Alex Edler, once again atoning for his mistakes, beat Pavelec three minutes later to tie the game up – similar to last game, a wrist shot was deflected and beat the helpless netminder.

From that point, the Canucks turned up the intensity and wanted the game.  It was exactly this effort that we had not seen in recent games.  Surprise hero Sammy Pahlsson capped the Canucks' comeback with a wicked wrist shot from the slot, which beat Pavelec high, glove side. 

It was a beautiful goal to cap off the scoring in what was truly an entertaining game.  The Jets came hard in the last five minutes, but the Canucks locked it down and prevented any grade A chances to seal the win.

I was thoroughly impressed with the second line tonight. Higgins, playing his best hockey since his problem with staph infections, was all over the ice.  He worked extremely well with Kesler and Booth, and the line was truly dominant almost every time it was on the ice. 

The line combined for 16 shots on net, and also hit the crossbar twice.  Vigneault must keep this line together going forward, it’s success is key to the Canucks’ ability to win games.  With both of the top two lines going, this team can be formidable.

Overall this game was just a treat to watch.  The two teams traded chances and while the Canucks were a bit unlucky not to win this game going away, the two goalies must be commended for some stellar play. 

The Jets are playing for their playoff lives (isn’t every team we play right now?), and it showed when they came out in the third with a vengeance.  That team actually has a lot of talented forwards and if they can attract a couple of key free agents, their future looks bright.

GAME OBSERVATIONS

• The Canucks defense rebounded from a few bad games recently with a solid effort tonight.  That said, while Edler made some nice plays offensively, he looked positively brutal on the two goals against.
• Chris Tanev was reinserted into the lineup in favour of Aaron Rome, to play alongside Marc Andre Gragnani.  Tanev was his normal, steady self.  I can’t believe the composure the slim 21 year old plays with.  His presence made the third pairing less an adventure than we’ve seen recently.
• I decried the continued use of Gragnani after a couple of iffy games, but I learned today via Team 1040 Radio that he needs to play a certain number of games in order to avoid being a certain class of unrestricted free agent.  This explains his continued use.
• The Sedins again failed to find the scoresheet, but that said, they did have a number of extremely good shifts and they looked awesome on the power play.  They truly are creating chances (they had nine tonight according to Cam Charron over at Canucks Army), but nothing is going in.  It is close, they just need to stick with it.
• I can't talk enough about how good Kesler and his line was tonight.  They were unbelievable, and lucky not to score three or four more goals.
• I tweeted tonight that it’s official – Mason Raymond may never score again.  He was moved to the third line tonight alongside Pahlsson and Hansen, and played his usual game.  He did, however, get one great scoring chance, but his shot deflected just past the post.  He’s snakebit.  This season’s a writeoff, but I’m seeing enough out of him to give me a small glimmer of hope for next year.
• Zach Kassian saw only one shift in the third period as it appeared Vigneault sat him down.  He’s been almost invisible the last couple of games and hasn’t been able to provide the physical presence that he’s expected to.
• I like having Lapierre and Malhotra on the ice.  AV continues to limit his line’s minutes, logging less than 10 minutes of icetime tonight.
• The refereeing was positively brutal tonight.  There’s been a lot in the media over the past couple days confirming what I’ve been saying for a while, which is that the officials are just not penalizing obstruction fouls they way we have become accustomed to.  Tonight, the referees failed to whistle down a number of potential Jets’ penalties – at least six, by my count, all occurring in the first two periods.  Some of them were obvious – Bieksa being clipped with a high stick drawing blood, right in front of the referee being the worst.  I’ve been trying to lay off the officiating, but tonight, it was an abomination, full stop.
• If the referees has blown down all the calls in the first period, with the way the Canucks PP was going, the game may have been over after 20 minutes.
• Vancouver ended up with 45 shots tonight, the most they have had in a game since December.
• The game had an energy that has been lacking for the Canucks home games lately.  The building had a lot of the Jets faithful and they were effective in being loud and proud, chanting, cheering, and the like.  I’m not used to this – but I liked it. An active visiting crowd always gets the home fans going, and that’s what happened tonight.
• Evander Kane – the guy is going to be an unbelievable hockey player.  I’ve watched him play since he was a slim, 15-year-old rookie with the Vancouver Giants.  He is fast, strong on the puck, uses his size well, and has a great wrist shot.  Tonight he accounted for a whopping 9 shots on net, almost a full one-third of Winnipeg’s total, in addition to four hits.
• Why is Kyle Wellwood such a strange, small guy?  There's just something off with him, but I can never quite put my finger on it.

PARTING SHOTS

Broadcast Observation of the Day:  Tonight’s broadcast featured extended coverage of the annual Canucks for Kids telethon, co-hosted by Sportsnet’s Don Taylor and legendary ex-Canuck Trevor Linden.  The Canucks for Kids fund donated $4.4 million last year to eligible charities.  I’m not sure how much was raised tonight, but it always warms the cockles of my heart to know how committed to the community and to local charities the Canucks are.

Looking ahead: The Canucks play host to the venerable Montreal Canadiens on Saturday night on Hockey Night in Canada.  Look for the stands to again to be full of visiting fans, as the Rouge, Blanc, Bleu always come out in force.