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Richard Bachman to make his 1st start of the year as Canucks visit the Wild |
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Thursday November 15 - Vancouver Canucks at Minnesota Wild - 5 p.m. - Sportsnet Pacific, Sportsnet 650
Vancouver Canucks: 20 GP, 10-8-2, 22 pts, second in Pacific Division
Minnesota Wild: 18 GP, 11-5-2, 24 pts, second in Central Division
We're one week away from U.S. Thanksgiving, where the old trope says that NHL playoff spots will be all-but-determined.
The Vancouver Canucks have defied that model a couple of times in recent seasons, including last year. The night before Thanksgiving 2017, they moved into the first wild-card spot in the Western Conference after their 5-2 road win over the Pittsburgh Penguins with an 11-8-3 record for 25 points in 22 games—and we all know how that turned out.
By the time the Canucks get to Thanksgiving 2018, they'll have played 24 games—two more than last season. In addition, last year 12 of the Canucks' 22 pre-Thanksgiving games came at home while this year they'll have played only nine of 24 at Rogers Arena. And at Thanksgiving last year, the Canucks were only midway through their second Eastern road swing and already had one trip to California under their belts. This season, they've already completed their visit to nine of the 16 rinks located in the Eastern Time Zone and will be in the middle of the California trip when Thanksgiving arrives.
After that, the boys will get a bit of an extended opportunity to sleep in their own beds. Between November 25 and December 26 they'll play 10 games at home, just three on the road, and have four breaks with at least two days off between games.
Before that, one last push. The Canucks will finish off their current road trip with a tough test against the Wild on Thursday before two games at Rogers Arena—including an early 4 p.m. start against Montreal on Saturday—then the three-in-four in California. Even that's a little tougher than usual: the trip starts in Anaheim, then goes up to San Jose before returning to L.A.
For the first time this season, the Canucks' road record fell below .500 after their disheartening 5-2 loss to the New York Islanders on Thursday. The team went 3-3-0 on its first Eastern swing, then 1-1-0 in the desert, but are 1-2-2 on this run. They'll need a W against the Wild to get back to level—and while they did beat Minnesota 5-2 at Rogers Arena back on October 29, the Wild are currently sitting fourth overall in the NHL. Always tough at home, Minnesota had won four in a row at Xcel Energy Center before dropping their first outright home loss of the season to Washington on Tuesday.
Devan Dubnyk was on the receiving end of a hard collision when Tom Wilson scored his first goal of the season in his first game back from suspension by driving hard to the net.
Minnesota coach Bruce Boudreau has hinted that Matt Hendricks might draw into the lineup after his team's loss. Between injuries and healthy scratches, the 37-year-old has appeared in just one of Minnesota's last 12 games. Will Zach Parise come out?
In Vancouver two weeks ago, younger brother Markus won the Battle of the Granlunds by scoring the opening goal of the game and helping the Canucks to the win. Mikael had to settle for one assist and a minus-two.
Overall, though, Mikael is winning the war. Though he was pointless against Washington, he's now up to 10 goals and 18 points on the season, while Markus is at 3-6-9 through 20 games and is pointless in his last two outings.
As for the Canucks, the big news is that Richard Bachman will get his first NHL start of the year after Jacob Markstrom has started the last nine straight games.
In his career, Bachman is 3-3-0 with the Canucks, with a .917 save percentage and 2.70 goals-against average. He has struggled this year in Utica, though, with a 1-4-0 record, .865 save percentage and 4.23 GAA.
Up front, here's how the Canucks looked at Thursday's morning skate. After scoring in Brooklyn on Tuesday in an elevated role, Brendan Leipsic is back in the bottom six.
Jacob Markstrom was late to the ice for the morning skate and reportedly isn't taking any shots.
Before I sign off for today, a quick spin around the world of the Canucks' prospects.
Let's start at Harvard, where freshman defenseman Jack Rathbone is off to a good start in his NCAA career. The Crimson got their first regulation win of the season against Brown last weekend, but Rathbone is sitting second among defensemen with 2-5-7 in five games, behind only highly-touted junior Adam Fox, who was dealt to Carolina as part of the Dougie Hamilton/Noah Hanifin trade this past summer.
Sticking with Boston-area freshmen, Tyler Madden has also started well at Northeastern. The Huskies are 6-3-1 and Madden is third on his team with 4-5-9.
Meanwhile, the Utica Comets dropped a 5-4 shootout decision to the Belleville Senators on Wednesday. The Comets have slipped to sixth place in the AHL's North Division thanks to a 3-5-1-1 record in their last 10 games but have been relying almost exclusively on Ivan Kulbakov in net since Richard Bachman was called up to the Canucks on October 28.
Though there was talk that Thatcher Demko would be getting into uniform this week and hopefully be back in game action by the weekend, apparently that's no longer the case. The latest news I saw is that he's still officially on the Canucks' roster (since he was injured during training camp) and won't play this week. Sigh.
To finish on a somewhat brighter note—our boy Olli Juolevi is now leading all AHL rookie defensemen in points with 1-12-13 in his first 16 North American games.
It's great to see him producing on a team that often struggles to score, but his defensive game is still a work in progress. Juolevi's minus-11 also gives him the green jacket among the AHL's 59 rookie defensemen—dead last in the league. He's looking like a player, but still has a way to go before he's ready to make the jump to the NHL.
That'll do it for today. Enjoy the game!
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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