Saturday November 14 - Toronto Maple Leafs 4 - Vancouver Canucks 2
For the first time this season, the Vancouver Canucks lost a game by more than one goal—though they had two disallowed as they fell to the Toronto Maple Leafs on Saturday night.
Here are your highlights:
To me, the losses that hurt are the ones that could have gone differently—where a single play might have changed the outcome, like in Buffalo a week ago. On Saturday in Toronto, it felt to me like there was no chance that the Canucks were going to leave the building with even a single point in their pockets. Best to just take it on the chin and move on.
The promise of Jannik Hansen on the first-unit power play was redacted after just one shift, but the team's hot hand managed to pick up his fifth goal of the year and had another disallowed when it was controversially ruled that he had kicked the puck into the net.
Ryan Miller says no way. Another night, another loss, another round of strong opinions.
I won't come down too hard on Miller for this loss—the Canucks gave up 40 shots to Toronto and, like I said earlier, it feels like this loss was basically inevitable. The large volume of rubber he faced means that he did get up to a .900 save percentage for the first time in five games, but it also means that the 35-year-old has faced more shots and played more minutes than any other goalie in the NHL.
After his strong start, he's now down to a .912 save percentage and 2.48 goals-against average—both 24th in the league. Miller may still have some good hockey in him, but he certainly needs a rest. In my mind, it's Markstrom time on Monday.
Apparently Willie's on board:
After being recalled from Utica earlier in the day, Hunter Shinkaruk did get a chance to suit up and take warmup on the hallowed ice of the ACC, even though he didn't get to play.
Special-teams play was a little better on Saturday. The Canucks scored a power-play goal for the second straight game, by Alex Burrows, and managed to avoid surrendering a shorthanded marker—though it was touch-and-go when Alex Edler tripped a streaking Michael Grabner as he headed in on a shorthanded breakaway. Miller was able to stop Grabner on the subsequent penalty shot, keeping him goalless for the season.
The Leafs did pick up one power-play goal of their own when P.A. Parenteau scored seconds after the Canucks had finished killing a long 5-on-3 midway through the middle frame—with two of their best penalty-killers, Horvat and Burrows, in the box.
With Toronto in the rearview mirror, the Canucks have already moved on to Montreal to prepare for Monday's matchup. Injured players Luca Sbisa and Brandon Prust have both rejoined the team and were on the ice for practice this morning.
Here's what we know about Burrows.
Apparently the team was aware of this situation, which is why Shinkaruk was recalled.
For the moment, that does slot Hansen back onto PP1. And PP2 is YOUNG. After Vrbata, the next-oldest player is 25-year-old Chris Tanev.
Tomorrow's game should be interesting. Carey Price is still injured and his backup, Mike Condon, finally suffered his first regulation loss last night against Colorado.
It was a doozy. Even though the Habs outshot the Avs 32-11 in the first two periods, Condon was pulled after 40 minutes with the score 4-1 for Colorado. I'm sure coach Patrick Roy must have gotten some sweet satisfaction out of that situation, especially since the Avs are now getting fantastic netminding from their own backup, Reto Berra, while Semyon Varlamov is shelved.
Like Toronto, Colorado has rebounded from a tough start and is now on a three-game winning streak, while Montreal's big lead in the standings has evaporated. The Habs are now tied with the Rangers and Dallas for first overall.
The Rangers have won eight in a row and can move into first place overall later today when they take on Toronto. Something's gonna have to give there!
To wrap up today—a quick thought about the scoring drought, offside and the coach's challenge.
When Radim Vrbata appeared to have scored last night with three seconds left in the third period, it wouldn't have changed the outcome of the game but it would have been a boost to the personal stats of the snakebitten sniper and perhaps helped him gain some confidence going forward.
But the goal was called back because Henrik Sedin was deemed to be offside—which he was, but which no one picked up until the Situation Room called it in. Apparently they now automatically review all goals scored in the last two minutes of a game, so the reversal didn't come from a coach's challenge from within the building.
Offsides were also in the spotlight earlier in the week, as Alex Ovechkin has been thwarted twice by the coach's challenge when he thought he'd scored the goal that would make him the highest-scoring Russian-born NHL player of all time.
Greg Wyshynski of
Puck Daddy pointed out that the league average of 7.2 offsides a game so far this season is well above the usual average of 5.5 a game, wondering if the threat of a coach's challenge is making linesmen call the play more tightly than they have in the past. But his data goes on to show that offsides are more common earlier in the season, as players are settling into their systems and finding their groove.
But that doesn't really address the impact of offside plays that are challenged. Ovi certainly lost a couple of goals that he would have had before the rule was implemented. So did Vrbata last night. And so did Jake Virtanen on a touch-and-go goaltender-interference call last week—one of many goals that have been called back around the league as a result of contact that seems to be pretty minor.
The NHL does keep a complete Situation Room blog
right here, which explains the details of every call they make. I wonder how many formerly-good goals have been scrubbed from the books around the league already this season?
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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