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Columbus Blue Jackets at Vancouver Canucks – Friday November 22 - 7:00 pm - Sportsnet Pacific, Fox Sports Ohio
Vancouver Canucks 11-8-4 fifth in Pacific Division Columbus Blue Jackets 8-11-3 tied for seventh in Metropolitan Division
The Vancouver Canucks will look to snap their five-game slump with back-to-back home games this weekend. The warmup is the Columbus Blue Jackets on Friday night and the main event will be the Chicago Blackhawks on Saturday.
The Canucks are still just one spot out of the Wild Card in the Western Conference, but now sit six points back.
Henrik Sedin admitted to Brad Ziemer of the Vancouver Sun that the team is well aware of its predicament in the standings:
In the past we always said, ‘we’re not looking at the standings,’ but that’s because we didn’t have to. You look at the East and you see where you would be and then you look at the West, or even our own division, it’s so tough. That’s why losing to San Jose in overtime, not being able to beat Dallas, that’s three points right there and we would have been right in the pack. That’s what’s tough.
The Canucks are at risk of being swept in their season series against the Jackets for the first time ever. They lost 3-1 in Columbus back on October 20 in a game that featured backups Curtis McIlhenney and Eddie Lack in net. Tonight, expect to see starters Sergei Bobrovsky and Roberto Luongo.
If the usual pattern holds, will Eddie Lack play Saturday against Chicago?
For their part, the Blue Jackets will be without Marian Gaborik, who suffered a sprained knee on November 14 and is out indefinitely. Brandon Dubinsky is day-to-day with a bruised foot and Matt Calvert is expected to rejoin the lineup after missing several weeks due to abdominal surgery.
John Tortorella admitted to Ziemer at practice on Thursday that he's at a loss for how to snap his team out of its funk. “We’re throwing it against the wall here a little bit,… he said. “We’ll see what sticks.…
The Sedins will be separated to start the game, which means the lines should look something like this:
Higgins-Henrik-Hansen Daniel-Kesler-Santorelli Kassian-Richardson-Burrows Weise-Welsh-Sestito
A point that is now worth noting: the twins' funk has come in the games since they signed their contract extensions on November 1. Henrik Sedin has four points in the subsequent eight games—a goal and three assists. Daniel Sedin had points in the first two games—a goal against the Leafs and an assist against the Coyotes, but has now been pointless in the last six games.
It's time to ask:
Fear of Failure?
After the Florida game on Tuesday, Henrik talked about how the team may have been playing to earn the single point. Here's the quote from Brad Ziemer of the Vancouver Sun:
“After they scored their second goal I thought we wanted to get the point badly and maybe we sat back a little too much and they got a lot of chances late in the game,… Henrik said. “It wasn’t the effort we wanted.…
Rather than pressing for the win in their home rink against a weak team, the Canucks let Florida attack and the single point was preserved only by a dazzling Roberto Luongo.
Have the Canucks become so afraid to make a mistake that they've lost the ability to play their own game? Are they scared that Tortorella will take a strip off them if they make a poor defensive play?
Torts continues to beat the drum of playing solid defense, which is fine. But there's a certain fearlessness that's required to score goals, and I think the Canucks are playing scared.
A couple of lucky bounces would be most welcome at this point.
Booth Busting
Jason Botchford of The Province has the latest on the David Booth saga.
At this point, Booth could probably clear waivers and be sent down to Utica, and he says he'd value the playing time. But if the Canucks do want to use their second compliance buyout on the forward this summer, a stint on the farm also means the possibility of injury. Booth gets injured a lot and an injured player can't be bought out. So, for now, he sits.
Booth described his conversations with John Tortorella, about what it means to be a bottom-six forward:
It was about me worrying about the defensive zone. When you’re on the third or fourth line, you really can’t give up much. I think the top two lines have a different responsibility and they can take some chances. When you’re up there, you can take a chance and you can get a break and you get your speed going. But when you’re in the bottoms six, the responsibilities are different. It’s a chip game. Get the puck into the zone and try to grind down the other team, and wear them down for Henk and Danny.
Doesn't sound like a great recipe to help a guy find his scoring touch.
Has Booth been hung up by Torts' system? It could be awhile before we'll get a chance to analyze him again.
I'll head to the rink tonight with apprehension—ready for another disappointment but hoping for a moment that will turn the tide back in a positive direction.
Thanks as always for reading and sharing your thoughts. I'll be back tomorrow with a recap and a preview of the 'Hawks tilt.