Follow me on 
By TwitterButtons.com
Last night the Senators tried to do everything in their power to play like the Bruins did last June. They tried to turn a hockey game into a street fight and they easily beat by the Canucks for trying to do so. This game was never in doubt for me, because anytime the other team puts Chris Neil on the ice for more than 12 minutes, I know they are losing the game.
The Canucks scored first, 4 seconds into their first power-play, when Alex Edler threw a wrist shot at the net that Craig Anderson couldn’t see. Where or what Anderson was doing on the play I have no idea, but to quote Luongo, “that’s an easy save if he stays in the net”.
7 minutes later the three fastest Canucks hooked up for a beautiful goal. Raymond got the puck up the boards and past the D, Hansen raced with the puck into the Senators zone and flipped a great pass to Kesler for a tap-in goal. Now that’s Canucks hockey!
The Ryan Kesler show continued in the second, as Kesler banged home a loose puck from a goal mouth scrum on the power-play, 3-0 Canucks. The Senators cut the lead to two, with a late goal in the period. Greening took a nice pass in the slot from Spezza and fired home his 7th of the season, but that is as close as the Senators would get. Weise would finish Vancouver scoring with a nice goal in the third.
The game was a chippy affair but if you’re going to run around and try and hit Vancouver at all cost, they’re going to make you pay at the other end. The Senators have a decent hockey team and they should be able to play a lot better against the Canucks, but when you start going out of your way and taking yourself out of position just to make a hit you’re going to get burned.
Almost half the hits the Senators threw last night they were taken out of position to do so. Yah you guys made a big hit, but that’s too bad because there’s a 3-on-2 going back the other way, good job guys. To beat the Canucks, you have to hit the Canucks that I agree with, but when you start going out of your way to do it, the Canucks will burn you.
Kesler
Kesler was the most dominating player on the ice tonight, but one shift in particular stood out to me. There was a shift he had in the in the first, after the Hodgson hit and just after Neil was running around on the twins and Burrows. Kesler came out to take the draw in his own end and he took the puck off the draw and went end-to-end for a scoring chance. He followed that chance up with a hit and dominated the whole shift. To me this shift sent a clear message that Kesler and the Canucks were not going to put up with any crap last night. You wanna run our players, we’ll make this a 10-0 game because we’re not going anywhere.
Weise
Weise played his best game as a Canuck. He scored one of the nicest goals of the year when he embarrassed Chris Neil by walking around him and beating Craig Anderson. He had three nice hits, and the fight he had was great. He took some shots and he gave some shots, but what I liked most about the fight was the passion that was in his eyes. He had that look like he said, “enough is enough, I’m going to put a stop to this right now”.
The Hits
I commented on the hits last night during the game, here’s the links to my thought’s if you missed it.
http://www.hockeybuzz.com/blog/Ian-Esplen/Hitting-and-Head-Shots---In-game-blog/164/40434
To summarize it,
Foligno/Hodgson hit- Nothing, just unfortunate
Neil/Burrows head shot- 1-2 games
Foligno/Kesler hit- 1-2 games
Update on Hodgson- from AV “He’s fine. He wanted to play, but our medical staff felt he should stay out. He should be okay”.
Canucks 3 Stars
1- Kesler
2- Weise
3- Hansen
The Fans
Last but not least, I just wanted to take my hat off to the great Canucks fans that were in Ottawa last night. Awesome job with the cheering and supporting of the team, I could hear the Luuuuu coming through my TV all night, and the towel waving and celebrating of the win made me feel like the game was being played at home. Great job to all that was there, give yourselves a big pat on the back this morning for a job well done.
Thanks for reading.
Enjoy your day.
Ian
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
Join the Discussion:
»