Monday January 27 - Vancouver Canucks vs. St. Louis Blues - 7 p.m. - Sportsnet Pacific, Sportsnet 650
Vancouver Canucks: 49 GP, 27-18-4, 58 pts, first in Pacific Division
St. Louis Blues: 49 GP, 30-11-8, 68 pts, first in Central Division
Now, things get real.
The Vancouver Canucks rolled through their bye week and All-Star Weekend with a luxurious one-point lead over four other teams in the Pacific Division.
After Elias Pettersson, Quinn Hughes and Jacob Markstrom walked away with the $1 million cheque thanks to Team Pacific's win in Saturday's 3-on-3 All-Star game, they were back with their regular squad for a stealthy practice at UBC on Sunday afternoon, to get the legs going before Monday's daunting matchup against the other first-place team in the West, the St. Louis Blues.
My forensic analysis of the boards in these photos suggests to me at the Blues skated on the other side of town on Sunday, at 8 Rinks. Agreed?
Despite being the host team, the Blues and their Central Division counterparts are now the one group that has never won a game since the NHL introduced the 3-on-3 All-Star Format in 2016.
The Pacific has now walked away with the giant cheque three times, and the Metro has won twice. The Atlantic Division won its first game ever on Saturday by knocking off the Metro by a score of 9-5 in the first round, then the Pacific earned a 10-5 win over the Central.
I thought Jacob Markstrom was in a tough spot, going first against the 'home' team. He gave up four goals on seven shots in his 10-minute period, leaving with the score tied 4-4 before the Pacific team cranked it up with six goals in the second half.
Tomas Hertl led the way with four — and funnily enough, I didn't hear one rooster joke. If he'd gone for it, that would have been the scandal of the weekend, taking the heat off Green Day for their potty-mouthed live performance.
Elias Pettersson and Quinn Hughes were primarily assigned to a line with Matthew Tkachuk — and if you're still clinging to the old nostalgia about how the Canucks could have picked Tkachuk instead of Olli Juolevi back at the 2016 draft, this rubbed a little salt in the wound. The trio worked effectively together. Petey led his team with six of their 28 shots and had one assist, while Quinn scored on his only shot and added three assists, and Tkachuk also finished with four points.
Huggy's goal certainly got the attention of honorary Pacific coach Wayne Gretzky:
The Championship game was more tightly contested. Once again, the Pacific Division easily outshot their opponents, going 20-11 against the Atlantic — and truthfully, 11 shots against in 20 minutes of 3-on-3 is some pretty impressive defending!
Petey was the leading scorer in the final, with two goals. Quinn had two assists and Markstrom stopped 4-of-7 this time, leaving with the score 3-1 for the Atlantic at the halfway mark and setting the stage for a big Pacific comeback.
To be clear, this was the game-tying goal. Hertl scored the game winner with 2:36 left to play — and it could be argued that he deserved the MVP award, despite being a fill-in sub for injured Logan Couture.
Also, give Petey credit for diplomatically taking the spot between Tkachuk and Leon Draisaitl for the team picture. Considering all the bad blood, everyone looks happy enough with a million-dollar cheque in their hands, don't they?
Also — I like this concept of having a uniform base jersey for each team, that also highlights individual team crests. Makes it much easier to follow 'our' players on the ice!
I wonder if the Blues players and coach Craig Berube will be energized or exhausted from hosting a busy All-Star weekend? One thing's for sure, they must have gotten a huge charge from the player introductions by their amazing superfan Laila Anderson, who could have a real future on the mic!
As always, by game's end I felt like I'd seen a bunch of unique moments that were well worth my time. I even went back on Sunday to watch a bit of Sportsnet's enhanced broadcast and take a peek at some of the puck and player tracking detail, like shift length and player speed. Also fun.
The early whispers are that next year's game will feature an international component — perhaps a country-against-country 3-on-3 tournament. I'm down with that idea; I still think the 3-on-3 works well and makes for plenty of offense, and can include back-checking without the need for any seriously hard-hitting play.
Anyway — back to Monday's game.
Given that the Canucks are 7-3-0 in their last 10 games and went into their break riding an impressive two-game winning streak and holding the longest active home-ice win streak in the NHL, it's not surprising to see that Travis Green is keeping things status quo against the Blues.
Goalie-wise, both Vancouver and St. Louis face the same dilemma, with Jacob Markstrom and Jordan Binnington both having competed over the weekend.
Travis Green is going back to Thatcher Demko, who got the win against San Jose in the last game before the break.
I wouldn't be surprised to see a Demko-vs-Jake Allen matchup — especially since the Blues are on a back-to-back and will also play Tuesday in Calgary.
Finally, a couple of quick AHL All-Star notes to wrap up today.
The big news out of Sunday's skills competition in Ontario, California was Martin Frk's record-setting hardest shot of 109.2 mph — which easily bested NHL winner Shea Weber's 106.5 mph and, oh yeah, set an all-time record.
Like Elias Pettersson, who turned some heads in the NHL competition on Friday, Frk is also a forward. Maybe we're seeing change in this competition now that the defenseman's booming slapper from the point is slowly disappearing from the game.
Click here for the full rundown of how the West beat the East 18-15 in Sunday's competition.
The Utica Comets' Brogan Rafferty also competed in the hardest shot, logging a respectable 97.8 mph to tie him for third place out of eight competitors. Rafferty was foiled in his try on the breakaway relay.
Utica's Reid Boucher, the AHL's leading scorer, was a late scratch from the event after being injured in Utica's game on Saturday, so Rafferty is holding down the fort for the Comets. Hope it's nothing too serious!
The AHL's 3-on-3 All-Star tournament runs Monday evening — at the same time as the Canucks game — 7 p.m., broadcast on TSN2.
Enjoy the games!
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
Join the Discussion:
»