As expected, Monday night's game between the Canucks and the Canadiens turned out to be a goaltending duel.
With new assistant coach Alex Burrows now in charge of the power play, Montreal got an early goal from Jeff Petry with the man advantage to take the first-period lead, then pushed for more during a strong second.
But the Canucks weathered the storm. And despite an ineffective 5-on-3 opportunity late in the first, they kept pressing until Adam Gaudette rifled a rare slap shot past Price with just 41 seconds remaining in regulation time. It was just the third goal of the year for Gaudette, who was on the ice with Boeser, Miller, Horvat, Pearson and Hughes while Thatcher Demko was pulled for the extra attacker.
Overtime solved nothing — and it's probably no surprise that just one goal decided the shootout. That belonged to Bo Horvat, who also delivered Vancouver's only other shootout win of the season — that crazy 6-5 affair against Montreal, just a week into the season.
The tide has finally turned. The Canucks have now won four of their last five games, making them the hottest team in the North Division over the past 10 days. And Thatcher Demko continues to dazzle. With another one-goal outing, stopping 29 shots, his save percentage ticks up three more points to .916 and his GAA drops to 2.75.
With the win, the Canucks climbed one point ahead of Calgary in the North. But the Canadiens' loser point still gives them a three-point edge as we head into Wednesday's contest (reminder, it's a late start time of 8 p.m. PT to accommodate the Sportsnet double-header that kicks off with Ottawa at Edmonton at 5 p.m.)
And while the Flames have only gone 0-1-1 since Geoff Ward was dismissed last week, the Darryl Sutter era didn't really start till Tuesday, when the new coach got on the ice with his team for practice for the first time.
For their next game on Thursday, the Flames will get the Habs, heading east from Vancouver for the second game of a back-to-back. I wonder if that will influence how Dominique Ducharme deploys his lineup against Vancouver, including his goaltending choice?
For his part, Burrows did his first Zoom as a Montreal assistant on Tuesday — and seems to have dazzled the Habs' press corps out of the gate.
#Habs new assistant coach Alex Burrows is handling his first Zoom conference with the media like someone who has been coaching in the NHL for 15 years. Very impressive the way he's answering questions in both languages. He couldn't be any more cool, calm and confident. #HabsIO
Listening to Burrows talk about his passion for hockey and his passion for the Montreal Canadiens... it's really bursting through with every comment. You can just see and hear how much this means to him. He's in the right place.
I'm happy for him. While he was playing, his reputation was so one-dimensional outside Vancouver. We saw a more complete person — and saw him evolve and change — as his role with the Canucks developed over the years.
The Q&A I did with him for Sportsnet not long before he waived his no-trade clause in 2017 is a great memory for me. He was very generous with his time, walking me back through his long journey to the NHL.
And speaking of no-trade clauses, it'll be interesting to see how the Canucks' trade-deadline plans might unfold this year, especially if the team keeps surging.
A couple of weeks ago, it seemed like a no-brainer that impending UFAs like Tanner Pearson, Brandon Sutter and Jordie Benn could be auctioned off to the highest bidder. But then Sutter indicated that he wants to stay. And during his presser last week, Jim Benning indicated that the club is hoping that it might be able to extend Pearson.
Meanwhile, in this week's 31 Thoughts, Elliotte Friedman mentions that the Canucks have fielded inquiries about both Tyler Motte and Nate Schmidt. He also adds, "This is the time for telephone flirtation, where teams ask about so many things that don’t go anywhere." But of course, both Motte and Schmidt had strong playoff performances in the Edmonton bubble last summer.
Motte has now been out of the lineup for more than a month, and is currently on long-term injured reserve with what has been termed a lower-body injury.
Motte is doing some light skating, has high ankle sprain, going to be a while yet but should return. https://t.co/mZKUuuMRzT
We've seen players with high ankle sprains take months before they get back to their usual levels — and Motte's tenacious skating is such an important part of his game. It'll be interesting to see if he can return at 100 percent before the deadline.
While I'm on the topic of Motte — who's celebrating his 26th birthday on Wednesday — I also want to applaud him for his continuing efforts to shine a spotlight on mental health.
He opened up again last month for a candid feature with Sportsnet:
Motte also spoke with Emily Kaplan of ESPN for this new piece this week about the mental health impacts of this strange NHL season and how, in some ways, it's even tougher than the bubble.
The 2021 NHL season is unusual and highly isolating. I talked to players about how it’s affecting their mental health.
"I never thought I would be doing an interview like this. But yeah, this season hasn't been easy." https://t.co/n8sfY3wdkx
As for Benn, he missed most of Monday's third period, but the NHL's ice-time sheet shows that he did come back to play the last shift of regulation, after Gaudette's goal. And he's on the ice for Wednesday's morning skate.
Looks like the #Canucks are using the same lineup as what they did on Monday.
So far, the Canucks have managed well without Pettersson, although his absence was certainly noticeable during that 5-on-3 on Monday. Hopefully whatever ails him will be cleared up before too long.
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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