Game day musings: Are the Canucks a contender?

After somewhat of a slow start to the season, much has been made of the Vancouver Canucks' 8-5-1 record on their recent fourteen game road trip. Combine that with the fact that they have one of the best goaltenders in the league, Henrik Sedin is second behind only Alex Ovechkin with ninety-one points on the season, and they currently sit second in the league in goal scoring, some are predicting a lengthy playoff run for the Vancouverites, perhaps even culminating in a championship. Inspired by Robert's game thread post at M&G, I've decided to take a magnifying glass to tonight's opposition.

Lack of scoring depth has been this team's downfall in the past, and shutting down the Sedin line was once a guaranteed route to victory. With Alex Burrows playing so well on a line with the twins and Mikael Samuelsson having a career season, the Canucks are already blessed with two thirty-goal scorers, with Henrik Sedin not too far off. They're not exactly defensive liabilities either. The Sedins are both +34 on the season while Burrows checks in at +31 and Samuelsson at +14. This is an especially bitter pill to swallow for Flames fans, since only Jarome Iginla has reached and exceeded the thirty-goal plateau and it's unlikely that any other Flames player will reach that total. On top of that, Samuelsson and Burrow's combined cap hit is $6.5 million. Ouch.

Speedster Mason Raymond has twenty-two goals on the season while shutdown king and agitator extraordinaire Ryan Kesler has nineteen goals and sixty-three points, all while facing some of the league's best game after game. Two very good forward lines can be awfully hard to shut down, but four is even harder. After Pavol Demitra and Steve Bernier, who have seen limited game action this season due to injury, things start to get a little murky. Aside from Wellwood and Hansen, the Canucks' bottom six is likely their biggest weakness and could potentially be exposed by an opposing team in the playoffs, despite Vigneault's strategic line matching.

When it comes to defence, Vancouver's blueline flies under the radar somewhat. The only two big names are Sami Salo and Christian Ehrhoff, and that may even be pushing it. Ehrhoff has 13-24-37 and is a +28; Salo: 8-16-24 and a +19. Both of which are better than Jay Bouwmeester's numbers. All three play against top quality competition for the most part, so the only real concession is the rotating nature of JBo's defence partners throughout the season and maybe the switch the Western conference, different opposition and style of play, and higher expectations.

Here's how a look at some of the Canucks' basic stats shakes down:

• 2nd in the league in scoring
• 2nd in team +/-
• 8th in goals against
• 5th ranked powerplay
• 19th ranked penalty kill (fourth most penalized team in the league)
• Avg. 30.6 shots for per game
• 51.3 faceoff winning %

Do these factors make Vancouver a Cup favourite? Probably not, but they do make them an able contender and a team I certainly wouldn't want the Flames to face, should they make the playoffs. This year's team remains relatively unchanged from the one that lost to the Blackhawks in six games last spring. It remains to be seen whether the changes that were made will be enough to vault the Canucks past a team like Chicago once again. It is widely believed that Roberto Luongo's performance at the Olympics, in particular the gold medal game, has quieted the critics who say he is incapable of winning the "big game," which also remains to be seen. Dependable goaltending, timely scoring, and a good powerplay, all mixed in with a pinch of luck, can work wonders in the playoffs. Worse teams have won the Stanley Cup.

I just hope for the sake of my ears and those of my fellow Flames fans that they bail out in the second round.

Long time no blog--Olympic edition

Canada's international hockey supremacy seems to go through peaks and troughs, much like my blogging tendencies.

Prior to 2002, the men's Olympic team hadn't won a gold medal for fifty years. After that, the tournament titles and medals seemed to come with ease once again: the world cup in 2004, five straight world junior championship titles, world championship titles, world under-eighteens, women's world championships, the Spengler Cup--you name it, Canada won it. That all changed about two years ago, however. Canada lost back-to-back world championships to the Russians and women's world championships to the United States, and then there was this year's loss to the Americans in the gold medal game at the world juniors and other tournaments like the world under-eighteens in which Canada did not meet expectations.

Now, Canada finds themselves in sixth place at the Olympic tournament, on home ice, after falling to the Americans last night in a back-and-forth affair where mistakes proved to be too many and too costly. Despite out-shooting and out-chancing the Americans almost 2-1, uncharacteristic gaffes by veteran goaltender Martin Brodeur and defencemen Chris Pronger and Scott Niedermayer cost Canada the game, combined with Ryan Miller's other-worldly performance in the U.S. net. The stars seemed to be aligned for the United States: fifty years since they had last beaten Canada at the Olympics, and thirty years since the 1980 "Miracle on Ice" team won the country's only gold medal in men's hockey.

Canada is now left searching for answers after going 1-1-1-0 and accumulating just five of a possible nine points in the preliminary round. Much like four years ago in Turin, and eight years ago in Salt Lake City. Who plays with Crosby? Who starts in goal? What's wrong with the powerplay? We should've chosen Green/Bouwmeester/St. Louis/Lecavalier/Jordan Staal/Stamkos/Smyth/Insert-name-of-Canadian NHL-player-here!

Sure it can be argued that Canada was the victim of some bad bounces last night against the Americans, maybe even that they were subject to some questionable officiating, but for two games now their defensive game has looked shaky and they have been consistently out-worked in their own zone. It's nice to see Doughty, Keith, and Seabrook, and Weber rise to the occasion when Pronger and Niedermayer, and to some extent, Boyle, struggle, but it would be even nicer to have them all on their game, all on the same page.

Today's practice supposedly focused primarily on defence and special teams, an area of this team's game that has irked me, specifically the power play. In the final minutes of the game against Switzerland, Canada had a golden opportunity to take the lead and win the game on the powerplay, but Babcock deployed the "Sharks unit" instead of putting Crosby, arguably his best player, on the ice.

The Shark line and the powerplay unit made up of Heatley, Marleau, Thornton, and Boyle has been largely ineffective with the exception of Heatley's four goals and Marleau's one. Thornton has zero, and just one shot on goal in 48:38 of ice time. The purpose of all three of these players making the team was the supposed "instant chemistry" that is purportedly essential in a short tournament like the Olympics. Why not go back to the Getzlaf-Heatley-Nash line that has been so effective in the world championships? This line does not have to be kept together.

Another qualm I have with the line combinations is the constant rotation of wingers on Crosby's line, partially because it makes me feel like I'm watching a Flames game but also because I fail to see any real faults with the original combination of Nash-Crosby-Iginla. Iginla had a hat trick in the first game they played together while registering under ten minutes of ice time, and Nash has been one of Canada's best players through three games. Why change that? Kent points out the futility of chemistry in these games and in the sport altogether over at Five Hole Fanatics, so can we assume that there are just too many players on this team not playing well enough to create chances and score goals? Canada's highly-touted depth has not yet been much of a factor in this tournament, and it remains to be seen if it ever will be.

Finally, we have the goaltending conundrum that seems to have emerged after Brodeur's shaky performance in goal. During the game against Switzerland, he was the victim of a perfect shot and a deflection off of a teammate's skate, and was unbeatable the rest of the way; there was no question that he would start the game versus the Americans. Sunday night was the complete opposite.

Brodeur created the bad bounces for himself by making bad decisions with the puck and finding himself out of position on more than one occasion, and now the job falls to Luongo who, although not tested against Norway, looked solid in the Canadian goal while the rest of the team struggled to find their legs. I'm usually the last person to support Roberto Luongo given my NHL allegiances, but Brodeur's performance last night in such an important game was unacceptable, and Luongo deserves an opportunity to better him; we all know he is more than capable, especially based on his stats leading up to the Olympic break versus Brodeur's numbers.

If Canada is to medal in men's hockey at these games, they have certainly taken the hard road there. This tournament was supposed to be about redemption. Canada was supposed to come into Vancouver, on home ice, and avenge a seventh place finish four years ago in Torino, and it'll likely be nothing short of a miracle if they manage a better result this time around. I don't know what it is going to take to get this team and this country back on top. They have the talent, without question, as do other countries in this tournament, but the desire and commitment seems to come in fits and starts, which perhaps explains the perplexing problem of Canada's wavering dominance at the international level.

Up Next: Canada takes on Germany in the qualification game on Tuesday, and will face Russia in the quarter-final on Wednesday, should they advance. I'll be over here crying into my pillow if you need me.

Go Canada.

Swine flu: the NHL's answer to biological warfare

It was confirmed yesterday that Oilers defenceman Ladislav Smid had the H1N1 virus after over half of the Oilers roster experienced varying degrees of the flu. The sports world is not immune to the H1N1 pandemic--in fact the conditions in most dressing rooms and arenas present an optimal breeding ground for the Swine Flu--and so far two other NHL players are currently sitting out with the virus and others claim to have had it as well.

The most worrying part of this news is that Smid did not miss a game while infected, which means he could have easily spread the Swine to other members of his team and (gasp) the opposition. Here's where my conspiracy theory kicks in--the Oilers played their last three games against Northwest division opponents, including the Flames, Canucks, and Avalanche, where Smid wasn't the only player with flu-like symptoms in the Oilers lineup. Could Swine Flu be the NHL's answer to biological warfare?

In all seriousness, this virus kills. The NHL should take it more seriously and encourage players to get vaccinated and stay away from practice/games and off-ice activities with their teammates if they are feeling under the weather. The league is taking the right steps in ensuring that players don't share water bottles or towels and having team trainers properly sanitize dressing rooms and equipment, but the players are also responsible for their own well being and, to a lesser extent, that of their teammates and other players around the league.

Flames forward Dustin Boyd missed practice Monday morning with the flu and has since been held out of further practices and will not be playing tonight as a precaution. I know that realistically, the Oilers could not have told half their roster to stay home and consume copious amounts of chicken noodle soup, but all players experiencing flu-like symptoms should be tested for the H1N1 virus and held out of the lineup until the results are confirmed; the organization should have handled the situation more carefully. Being a slightly obsessive-compulsive hypochondriac myself, I received the H1N1 vaccine today and am not experiencing any adverse effects apart from a sore arm; I encourage everyone else, especially athletes, to do the same.

In other news...

Roberto Luongo is injured and out indefinitely with...(drumroll please)...a hairline fracture in his rib. He is expected to miss about a week. Anticlimactic, isn't it? Whatever makes you feel better about allowing five goals in front of Stevie Y and Team Canada management, Bobby Lu.

I don't have Centre Ice or the NHL Network, so the games I get to choose from tonight (aside from the Flames/Avs game, which I ordered on PPV. It's my first PPV experience and I'm curious as to what all the fuss is about. Will report findings later) are Leafs vs. Stars and Sens vs. Panthers. You spoil me, TSN. Why the hell would I want to watch sub-par, Ontario-based teams play mediocre, Southern-U.S. based teams? You do know there are NHL franchises located outside of Ontario, right? The Coyotes haven't been relocated quite yet.

Adam Pardy draws back into the lineup tonight for the Flames in place of Aaron Johnson. What took so long?

IF the Flames get bodies to the net, shoot the puck, and play with disciplined physicality, they could edge Anderson and the Avs. If they don't, well, I just wasted fourteen dollars of my parent's money and this could be a very long night. We all saw how the Avs created offence off of turnovers and clogged up the neutral zone worse than fat clogs up Kyle Wellwood's arteries last night against the Oilers; Sutter and Co. undoubtably took note of that. The Flames will have to make sure they protect the puck well and not focus on gaining entry into the offensive zone solely by carrying it in; sometimes a good dump-in followed by a solid forecheck works wonders. There's probably a joke there but I can't be bothered to think about it.

May the best team win, but preferably the Flames.

PS: GET VACCINATED. THE GOVERNMENT IS NOT SPYING ON YOU BY IMPLANTING TRACEABLE MICROCHIPS INTO YOUR ARM FAT.