The Vancouver Canucks get back to practise today to start preparing for their back-to-back weekend games against Columbus on Friday and Chicago on Saturday.
The Blue Jackets recovered from Tuesday's 7-0 drubbing by Edmonton with a 2-1 overtime win over the Calgary Flames on Wednesday, while the Chicago Blackhawks look to bounce back from their loss against Colorado when they play the second game of their seven-game road trip tonight in Winnipeg.
The Canucks are halfway through their longest homestand of the year, with just two points to show for their efforts so far. The team hasn't slumped this badly since Mike Gillis' first season with the team.
From January 9 - 31, 2009, the Canucks went 0-5-3, with seven of the eight losses coming at home. The streak began when Roberto Luongo was on the shelf with his groin injury and coincided with Mats Sundin's arrival: he was playing just his second game with Vancouver when the losing began.
Here's how the games went down:
Jan 9 6-4 loss to St. Louis Blues Jan 10 4-2 loss to San Jose Sharks Jan 13 5-3 loss to New Jersey Devils Jan 15 5-1 loss to Phoenix Coyotes (Luongo returns to action) Jan 18 6-5 shootout loss to Columbus Blue Jackets Jan 20 2-1 overtime loss at San Jose Sharks ALL STAR BREAK Jan 28 5-3 loss to Nashville Predators Jan 31 4-3 overtime loss to Minnesota Wild
The streak was finally broken on February 3 with a 4-3 win over the Carolina Hurricanes on a late goal from Alex Burrows. The Canucks went 20-6-2 the rest of the way that year, ultimately winning the Northwest Division and sweeping the St. Louis Blues in the first round of the playoffs before falling to the Chicago Blackhawks.
A good reminder that it's early days and things might turn around. I certainly remember Sundin's time here more for that grim start then for the strong finish that started the Canucks' ascent to their three best seasons in franchise history.
World Juniors Preview:
The annual IIHF World Junior Championship is just over a month away, and the Canucks will have some prospects to watch this year.
Lucas Aykroyd is a Vancouver hockey writer with a focus on international hockey. He has been covering World Juniors, World Championships and the Olympics for IIHF.com for a number of years, and will be heading to Sweden for this year's junior tournament.
I asked him to to share some thoughts about the event and about the future Canucks.
How many World Junior Championships have you attended?
I’m gearing up to cover my sixth IIHF World Junior Championship (Malmo, Sweden) for IIHF.com. My previous five were in Vancouver (2006), Ottawa (2009), Regina and Saskatoon (2010), Edmonton and Calgary (2012), and Ufa, Russia (2013).
It’s a wonderful tournament to cover. The only real downside is missing the chance to catch up with family and friends back home over the holidays. But the exuberance of the players and the speed of the games make it all worthwhile. You have teenagers showing off NHL-caliber skills but also making mistakes that would get you benched by Ken Hitchcock for 20 games. That’s fun hockey to watch.
Tell us about the Canucks prospects you expect to see at the tournament in Sweden this year.
This year, the two Canucks prospects I most expect to see in Sweden are Canada’s Bo Horvat and Hunter Shinkaruk.
Horvat, the captain of the OHL’s London Knights, already brings a man’s physique and attention to defensive detail at age 18, and he’s off to a strong offensive start with 28 points in 19 games. Being tutored by coach Dale Hunter is unlikely to hurt him in Canadian coach Brent Sutter’s eyes. During the pre-season with Vancouver, Shinkaruk, who captains the WHL’s Medicine Hat Tigers, showed flashes of the offensive creativity and lickety-split skating that Canada will need on the big ice in Malmo.
Brendan Gaunce, the captain of the OHL’s Belleville Bulls, got so-so reviews from Sutter during the summer evaluation. But he could work his way into the mix with a strong showing for the OHL side during the Subway Super Series exhibition games against Russia (Nov. 21 and 25).
Big defenceman Anton Cederholm, playing solidly for the WHL’s Portland Winterhawks so far, could receive consideration for the host Swedes as well. What are some of the unique experiences that come from covering World Juniors?
There are always reminders of how fast time moves in the hockey world. I remember seeing Thomas Gradin, Harold Snepsts, and Ron Delorme all sitting together in the media cafeteria at the Brandt Centre in Regina eating pizza. They’re Canucks scouts now, but I still think of them as the guys who led the charge to the 1982 final against the New York Islanders.
I interviewed Rob Brown at the 2012 tournament in Calgary. In my head, he’s this young dude with a blonde mullet scoring 200 points for Kamloops, but now he’s a dad explaining to his son what Communism was like during the '88 World Juniors in Moscow. It makes you appreciate these moments. For many of these players, the tournament will be their career highlight.
====
I'll have more memories from Lucas in a future blog, including past World Junior standouts and busts and his projections for this year's tournament.
With Horvat and Shinkaruk looking like the Canucks' best prospects in awhile, it should be an interesting tournament for Vancouver fans this year.
Tomorrow—back to the usual, with a preview of the Columbus game and a look at any news that might filter out from today's practice.