I keep reminding myself that results are not the important part of these YoungStars games. Rosters have been thrown together and include plenty of players who won't even get a sniff at a minor-league contract. It's more about seeing what kind of opportunities the players can create for themselves.
On Sunday, the Canucks' prospects showed some jam when they made a late charge for the second straight game, coming back from a 4-1 deficit to force overtime before falling thanks to a sweet shot from Winnipeg's Nic Petan.
Here are your highlights:
On the whole, it was a scrambly game. Elliott Pap of the
Vancouver Sun says the best thing we've seen so far is Hunter Shinkaruk's
ability to generate offense.
With two goals on Sunday, Shinkaruk was singled out for praise by coach Travis Green, who doesn't seem like he's particularly generous with kind words:
“It’s no secret what Hunter is,” said Travis Green, who is coaching the Canuck prospects in Penticton. “He is a goal scorer and he did what he likes to do and scored two big goals. I’m a big believer that everyone has to play the game the right way and Hunter backchecked hard and did all the little things that are going to entitle him to ice time and to playing at the next level. So I liked his game today. I did. ”
Here are more postgame comments from Green:
Green felt the game was better as a whole, thought Brendan Gaunce played better in a third-line checking role and had no problem whatsoever with Dane Fox's fight after the Jets went up 2-1 in the second period. Apparently Foxy has a little way to go before Green considers him to be in the same category as the Sedins, Crosby and Malkin.
It took some digging to find the box score, but you can check it out
here.
Notable details:
• Overall, the Canucks outshot the Jets 39-29.
• Hunter Shinkaruk scored his two goals on eight shot attempts. He is finding the net!
• Frank Corrado rebounded from a rough outing in Game 1 with a plus-two performance on Sunday. Centres Gaunce and Horvat were also plus-two.
• tough defenseman Mackenze Stewart got rocked by a single punch in his second-period fight with Zach Bell
• tryout prospect Curtis Valk scored a pretty goal, giving him three for the tournament so far
Disappointing not to see Nikolaj Ehlers in the game for Winnipeg. He suffered a groin injury in the Jets' first game of the tournament. It's not believed to be serious but for a young player who's on the small side, I wonder if that's a sign that his durability will be an issue over the long haul.
The three stars in the games were the Jets' Nic Petan and Scott Kosmachuk, with Hunter Shinkaruk drawing third-star honours.
The Canucks will wrap up the tournament today—already!—with a game against Calgary at 5:30. Once again, the game will be streamed on Canucks.com and on TEAM1040.
Looking at today's
pregame notes, one detail that jumps out at me is the Canucks' woeful penalty-killing. Not a huge deal that the cobbled-together team isn't super-tight defensively, but the same circumstances hold for the other teams in the tournament. Vancouver is ranked fourth out of four, with a 72.7 efficiency rate.
Players to watch for the Flames today will include fourth-overall pick Sam Bennett and NCAA standout Johnny Gaudreau—a little guy with dazzling moves. He played his first NHL game against the Canucks at the end of last season—and scored his first goal on his first shot. "Johnny Hockey" got people talking with this Bure-esque goal against Winnipeg on Friday:
Gaudreau's listed at 150 pounds on
HockeyDB.com, so I'll assume that his listed weight of 215 on the pregame notes is a typo. If it's not, the kid's gonna be a tank out there today!
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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