Wednesday February 10 - Vancouver Canucks 2 - Arizona Coyotes 1
The Vancouver Canucks moved into fourth place in the Pacific Division and now sit just two points out of a Western Conference wild-card spot after a 2-1 road win over the Arizona Coyotes on Wednesday night.
Here are your highlights:
The Canucks were missing three regulars from their lineup. Derek Dorsett was a late scratch after it was announced earlier in the day that Alex Edler and Brandon Sutter had both been sent home from Colorado with broken bones.
The official word from the team is that Dorsett was ill. Dan Murphy has another theory:
Dorsett took and elbow to the face last night and left in the first period. But he did come out for 2nd. #Canucks
The lineup changes prompted Willie Desjardins to move Radim Vrbata back up the lineup to play with Bo Horvat and Sven Baertschi, while Jared McCann and Adam Cracknell joined Jake Virtanen on the fourth line.
Though they played less than 10 minutes in the game, the fourth line combined for a pretty goal on its second shift when Jared McCann threaded a beautiful pass through to Jake Virtanen on the rush, opening the scoring at 6:27 of the first period.
Later in the first, the Coyotes appeared to have tied things up but for the second straight game, a coach's challenge went in Vancouver's favour. On Tuesday, Patrick Roy was unsuccessful in his attempt to generate a goaltender interference call against the Canucks; last night, Willie Desjardins was rewarded when he correctly asserted that the Coyotes' goal had come on an offside play.
That's the kind of break that simply wasn't going Vancouver's way earlier in the season.
The Canucks enjoyed more puck luck on the game-winning goal late in the second. Jannik Hansen got credit for this double-deflection that went into the net off Oliver Ekman-Larsson.
Maybe that play was part of the Coyotes' own secret tanking strategy as they try to set themselves up for a shot at hometown boy Auston Matthews?
Later, in the third, Alex Biega showed that he was stepping in for injured Alex Edler in every way when he pulled off one of Edler's favourite moves—the goal-line stop behind Ryan Miller.
Biega played last night with Matt Bartkowski as my 44+55 "Wayne Gretzky" defensive pairing was reunited, while Dan Hamhuis and Luca Sbisa continue to look good together. That left Ben Hutton to move up to the top pairing alongside Chris Tanev—and Hutton finished the night as a plus-one in a team-leading and career-high 23:14 of ice time. Big night for the rookie, even though Biega got the glory.
Biega just tried to speak to the media, but teammates started barking so loudly for the bulldog, he couldn't. #Canucks
Though Biega was the game-saver on that play, Ryan Miller did play well overall, earning his first win since the New York Islanders game on January 17 while making 33 saves—Arizona outshot Vancouver 34-26 on the night.
The two wins this week move the Canucks up to 21st overall in the league, now ahead of Arizona and tied with Minnesota in the Western Conference standings. The wild card is now within reach—Nashville and Colorado are both just two points ahead of the Canucks, and Colorado has played two more games than Vancouver. Nashville's even, at 54 games.
Catching Anaheim seems a bit more dubious. The Ducks are now three points ahead in third place in the Pacific Division, with two games in hand, and they're rolling, with an 8-2-0 record in their last 10 games.
According to Sports Club Stats, the Canucks' playoff chances increased by 7.1 percent last night and now sit at 32.8 percent. Vancouver is Canada's best hope once again!
If you missed it, here are the players who have been recalled to fill the gaps in the lineup caused by Sutter and Edlers' injuries:
To replace Edler (fractured foot) and Sutter (fractured jaw), #Canucks will recall Weber and Friesen.
Friesen's a 25-year-old center who was selected by the Canucks in the sixth round back in 2010. He's undersized at 5'10" and ranks seventh on the Utica Comes this season with 8-10-18 in 41 games. It's his first callup, and he certainly has some fans from his days back in junior:
Alex Friesen: heart + soul for Niagara w/ Andrew Agozzino. Drafted 6th Rd by Vancouver. Battled at AHL +now NHL'er. Damn that's awesome!
Friesen showed well during the Canucks' training camp last fall. I wouldn't bet on him getting into the lineup anytime soon but if he does, I believe he'll be the eighth player to make his NHL debut with the Canucks this season after Ben Hutton, Jared McCann, Jake Virtanen, Brendan Gaunce, Andrey Pedan, Alexandre Grenier and Hunter Shinkaruk.
Finally, TSN's Bob McKenzie made some waves on Wednesday in this article when he said "the Canucks apparently haven’t, as of today, received a single call, not one, from another team inquiring about (Dan) Hamhuis’s availability (at the trade deadline)."
I'm not going to read too much into this for the moment. McKenzie also mentions that the Canucks' pro scouting meetings won't go down till the end of next week—February 20 and 21—and Jim Benning has been adamant that he won't make any decisions about moving players until that time.
Considering last night was just Hamhuis' third game back after his facial injury, I can understand other teams wanting to see how he performs on the ice before they start thinking about trade-deadline deals. He has looked good, so I'd say his stock is rising.
If I was on the Canucks' management team, I'd spend the next 10 days gauging interest from other teams and getting a sense of what's on offer. If an appealing proposition is presented, then it's time to see if Hamhuis will waive his no-trade clause.
Jason Garrison and Kevin Bieksa didn't want to leave, either. And it reportedly took a couple of tries with both those guys to set up a deal that worked for all parties. Hamhuis certainly seems like a guy who wants to stay put but there's still plenty of time for things to change over the next two and a half weeks.