Thursday, February 19, 2004
WILD 6, CANUCKS 2
This is quite a way for the team to step up after learning Markus Naslund (their captain) would be out two weeks with a concussion. This was absolutely embarrassing.
Marc Crawford looked up at the video replay board in utter dismay after seeing the first Minnesota goal. He would have to go back for seconds. Repeatedly.
The Wild tallied three goals in a first period in which the Canucks came out horribly flat and unprepared, and that was all she wrote tonight as the Canucks had a teamwide crappy game tonight, squandering a golden opportunity to move within two points of Colorado, who were spanked in Denver by the Edmonton Oilers last night. The Canucks managed to match their worst loss of the season, a different 6-2 defeat at the hands of the Oilers at the Garage.
The only glimmer of hope out of this game was their first power play goal in forever (I didn't get the exact stat) for the Canucks, tallied by Todd Bertuzzi, who had gone a few games (sorry, unspecific again) without a point. How do I know it was the first power play goal in forever? McDonalds does a power play contest in the Lower Mainland where they give away an amount of money every time a Canuck scores a power play goal, and the pot increases every time they don't score on a power play. The Canucks' flagship station is CKNW 980, so they start the pot with $98 CDN. A lady won the pot on the Bertuzzi goal, and by then it was up to $328 CDN. Insane. Of course, that's probably equal to about $13 US.
The defense was crappy, and the goaltending was crappy. Blown coverage ran rampant, and not helping was Mike Keane pulling down Antti Laaksonen, leading to a penalty shot on which he converted. Dan Cloutier gave up four goals on a paltry 10 shots. Terrible.
The Wild played less than two minutes on the power play tonight, and the Canucks piddled away a lot more power play time than that, though the Bertuzzi goal came through on the power play, but the Laaksonen penalty shot was assessed during a Wild penalty. There have been 43 penalty shots in the NHL this season, and 15 have been converted. The Wild are 4-for-5 on penalty shots.
It was quite apparent that Minnesota and their fans hate the Canucks much more than the Canucks hate the Wild. The problem is, the Canucks aren't upping their game to the level of the Wild, and you'd think that would change after losing the final three games of a playoff series against the same team in which they had a 3-1 series lead. The Canucks lost those final three games to the Wild last year by scores of 7-2, 5-1, and 4-2. Play-by-play man John Shorthouse said tonight was the low point in the season for the Canucks, who are 2-5-0-1 in their last eight games.
The Wild had a comfortable lead to the point where they started settling scores from last year's playoffs in the third period. They came right after Matt Cooke, who of course ran away from the fight, not only due to his reputation, but because he was outmatched. Matt Johnson came out of the penalty box and gave Matt Cooke the mother of all two-handed slashes, for which he was penalized. Cooke responded by spearing Johnson in the belly, something the refs somehow did not catch. The Wild got a sick dose of what the Canucks felt the other night when Naslund went down, except they're probably not losing Johnson for two weeks, nor was he their captain or the NHL's leading scorer.
Canucks face Edmonton on Saturday. The NHL could assess the Cooke/Johnson situation.
Purely embarrassing.
[Edit Fri ~4:23a -- Forgot to say the goals were Todd Bertuzzi (17) and Mattias Ohlund (8). Photos here.]
Marc Crawford looked up at the video replay board in utter dismay after seeing the first Minnesota goal. He would have to go back for seconds. Repeatedly.
The Wild tallied three goals in a first period in which the Canucks came out horribly flat and unprepared, and that was all she wrote tonight as the Canucks had a teamwide crappy game tonight, squandering a golden opportunity to move within two points of Colorado, who were spanked in Denver by the Edmonton Oilers last night. The Canucks managed to match their worst loss of the season, a different 6-2 defeat at the hands of the Oilers at the Garage.
The only glimmer of hope out of this game was their first power play goal in forever (I didn't get the exact stat) for the Canucks, tallied by Todd Bertuzzi, who had gone a few games (sorry, unspecific again) without a point. How do I know it was the first power play goal in forever? McDonalds does a power play contest in the Lower Mainland where they give away an amount of money every time a Canuck scores a power play goal, and the pot increases every time they don't score on a power play. The Canucks' flagship station is CKNW 980, so they start the pot with $98 CDN. A lady won the pot on the Bertuzzi goal, and by then it was up to $328 CDN. Insane. Of course, that's probably equal to about $13 US.
The defense was crappy, and the goaltending was crappy. Blown coverage ran rampant, and not helping was Mike Keane pulling down Antti Laaksonen, leading to a penalty shot on which he converted. Dan Cloutier gave up four goals on a paltry 10 shots. Terrible.
The Wild played less than two minutes on the power play tonight, and the Canucks piddled away a lot more power play time than that, though the Bertuzzi goal came through on the power play, but the Laaksonen penalty shot was assessed during a Wild penalty. There have been 43 penalty shots in the NHL this season, and 15 have been converted. The Wild are 4-for-5 on penalty shots.
It was quite apparent that Minnesota and their fans hate the Canucks much more than the Canucks hate the Wild. The problem is, the Canucks aren't upping their game to the level of the Wild, and you'd think that would change after losing the final three games of a playoff series against the same team in which they had a 3-1 series lead. The Canucks lost those final three games to the Wild last year by scores of 7-2, 5-1, and 4-2. Play-by-play man John Shorthouse said tonight was the low point in the season for the Canucks, who are 2-5-0-1 in their last eight games.
The Wild had a comfortable lead to the point where they started settling scores from last year's playoffs in the third period. They came right after Matt Cooke, who of course ran away from the fight, not only due to his reputation, but because he was outmatched. Matt Johnson came out of the penalty box and gave Matt Cooke the mother of all two-handed slashes, for which he was penalized. Cooke responded by spearing Johnson in the belly, something the refs somehow did not catch. The Wild got a sick dose of what the Canucks felt the other night when Naslund went down, except they're probably not losing Johnson for two weeks, nor was he their captain or the NHL's leading scorer.
Canucks face Edmonton on Saturday. The NHL could assess the Cooke/Johnson situation.
Purely embarrassing.
[Edit Fri ~4:23a -- Forgot to say the goals were Todd Bertuzzi (17) and Mattias Ohlund (8). Photos here.]
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