Tanner Pearson suits up with Pettersson and Boeser as Canucks visit Avs (william lockwood)

william lockwood

Tanner Pearson suits up with Pettersson and Boeser as Canucks visit Avs

By Carol Schram

Feb 27, 2019 • 3:42 pm

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Wednesday February 27 - Vancouver Canucks at Colorado Avalanche - 6:30 p.m. - Sportsnet Pacific, Sportsnet 650

Vancouver Canucks: 63 GP, 27-28-8, 62 pts, fifth in Pacific Division Colorado Avalanche: 63 GP, 27-24-12, 66 pts, fourth in Central Division

Tanner Pearson is expected to make his debut as the Vancouver Canucks open a crucial three-game road trip on Wednesday night in Denver against the Colorado Avalanche.

Pearson is wearing his traditional No. 70 and slotting directly in with Elias Pettersson and Brock Boeser.

Adam Gaudette did not travel with the team due to illness. That leaves Tim Schaller as the healthy scratch up front, while Alex Edler and Guillaume Brisebois are the extras on the blue line—Batchelor uncharacteristically overlooked a pairing, skipping over Pouliot-Biega, when he tweeted out the lines.

Wednesday's game kicks off a back-to-back series, which continues in Glendale on Thursday. Jacob Markstrom has shown this season that he's more than capable of playing on consecutive nights; I'm curious whether that'll be the case again on this trip, or if a healthy Thatcher Demko will get the nod against the Coyotes.

After a heartening 4-0 shutout win over the Ducks on Monday, the Canucks will be looking to win back-to-back games on Wednesday for the first time since before the All-Star break: last time it happened was against Buffalo and Detroit at Rogers Arena on January 18 and 20.

Vancouver will need to put a bit of a streak together in order to make up any ground in the Western Conference playoff race. On Tuesday, the Wild and Coyotes each won their fourth-straight games, while the Stars gave up a late goal to take a regulation loss against Vegas. So Minnesota has now climbed back into the first wild-card with 68 points, Dallas is in the second spot with 67, Colorado could overtake the Stars with a win tonight and the Canucks currently sit five points out.

The Avs are currently on a five-game point streak. After winning four in a row, they dropped a 4-3 overtime decision at home to Florida on Monday. They've now turned things around from their recent dry spell, which included the Canucks' 5-1 win at Pepsi Center coming out of their bye week. The Avs are once again firing on all cylinders offensively, with 23 goals in their last five games. They've allowed just eight goals over that same stretch, and Semyon Varlamov has picked up two shutouts.

Varlamov is expected to get the nod in net again on Wednesday. Here's how the rest of the Colorado lineup will look.

The Avs' trade-deadline pickup was forward Derick Brassard—acquired for the bargain price of a 2020 third-round pick. I'm a Brassard fan from his gold-medal stint with Team Canada in Russia at the 2016 World Championship. It was his first time wearing the maple leaf since the U18 level and he led that stacked team with 11 points in 10 games.

Looking at the final stats from that tournament, Team Canada could also now be known as Team 2019 Trade Deadline. The top three scorers were Brassard, Matt Duchene and Mark Stone—and Cam Talbot was the starting goalie.

Now on his third club this year after having been shuffled from Pittsburgh to Florida before being dealt to Colorado, Brassard picked up his 11th goal of the season in his first game in a Colorado uniform on Monday.

Now, a couple of prospect notes before signing off for today. As you may have seen, newly traded Jonathan Dahlen had some choice words for reporters after making his debut with the San Jose Barracuda on Tuesday.

FTF: What was challenging about Utica?

JD: It’s a hard question.

It’s a great group of guys there. Great teammates. They’re really nice, everybody there. Great captains and vets and everything. Had a Grade-A experience with the team there.

I’m just happy to get a fresh start now. Try something else. Try to feel good about myself again. Get confidence.

I know there has been quite a bit of debate recently about whether or not the Comets are having success at developing prospects. I think the only way to really answer that is by taking a look at how they stack up against other organizations.

My general feeling is that minor-league hockey is a tough situation—coaches trying to create winning environments and get players to work together as a team, while the players are also competing against each other for the opportunity to climb to the next level. That's a really tricky dynamic to navigate, and most of the players aren't getting those sweet bi-weekly paycheques to make life easier, either. There's a reason why it's jokingly referred to as the Always Hungry League.

We know that Dahlen was uncomfortable enough in his first year in Utica that he quickly pulled the pin and went back to Sweden, where he had a terrific season with Timra. This year, things went better for him, but he was clearly still somewhat dissatisfied.

I'm not surprised to hear Dahlen trying to put the best possible spin on things in his new situation; the last thing he wants is to be perceived as a malcontent from Day 1.

Time will tell if the Barracuda are able to put him in a situation to succeed, or if Dahlen does turn out to be another player who can't quite put the pieces together to become a full-time NHLer.

On a brighter note, the Canucks' prospect pool could get a major talent infusion over the next month or so:

Here are some notes on timing:

Northeastern has a record of 21-9-1 this season and is ranked ninth in the latest USA Today men's hockey poll, up from No. 13 last week. Considering this was supposed to be a rebuilding year for them after losing Hobey Baker winner Gaudette and his linemate Dylan Sikura, they've had a fantastic season. Defenseman Jeremy Davies leads the Huskies in scoring with 31 points in 30 games, then Tyler Madden is tied for second with 25 points in 28 games. It's good, but it's a far cry from Gaudette's 30-30-60 in 38 games last season. Before that, Gaudette recorded 30 points as a freshman, then 52 as a sophomore.

Madden's stock has shot up this year, but I don't see it as a sure thing that he should turn pro this season.

Hughes and Lockwood: yeah. In their second season under Mel Pearson after the retirement of the legendary Red Berenson, Michigan is a middling 13-12-7 this year. Their record in the Big East is 9-8-5, which puts them in a tie for third place in the conference with Notre Dame. After going 5-24-29 in 37 games as a freshman last season, Hughes is up to 5-27-32 in 28 games so far this year.

Lockwood is approaching the end of his junior year, so this is the key time for the Canucks to sign him before he goes into his final year of college eligibility and moves towards the situation when he could become a free agent who's eligible to sign with any team. He has bounced back nicely from a serious shoulder injury last season, second in team scoring behind Hughes with 14-14-28 in 32 games.

According to CapFriendly, the Canucks currently have 46 players under NHL contracts. That leaves four spots open before they hit the maximum of 50—definitely enough to sign their own NCAA prospects and leave room for potential free agents from both the college and major junior ranks.

Enjoy the game!

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