I couldn’t believe when I heard that that was Henrik Sedin’s first career hat trick.  I mean, I know the guy isn’t as prolific a scorer as his brother, but I certainly would have thought that he’d have gotten a hat trick by now. 

I don’t know which made me happier – the Canucks being up as quickly as they were, or the Leafs already being down by a pair with only four minutes gone in the first period in their game against the Flames.  Pity that a loss like that had to come at the hands of a Northwest division team.  But oh well.

The Canucks more than got the monkey of their recent three game skid off their backs with their performance last night.  Although they did manage to let the Avs make it a little interesting with their two goals before stepping on the gas again and leaving Colorado in the dust.  It was hardly what I’d call a complete game, but this was one of those nights where they didn’t really need to go hard for the full 60 minutes.  It would have been better if they *had*, but you can’t always have everything.

Mason Raymond played a hell of a game, though, particularly on Hank’s second goal, getting down the ice and sending the puck back out into the slot for Henrik to chip both the puck and himself over Craig Anderson.  Also great to see were Mathieu Schneider and Jannik Hansen picking up goals, along with Steve Bernier (with a pair!) and even Tanner Glass.

Now the Canucks have some time off (5 days again?!?) before they start a 5 game western home stand that could go a long way towards helping them make up some ground and get back to where they should be – at the top of the Northwest standings.  Sure, only two of those games are against NW teams (Avs again and Oilers), but it’s safe to say that they’ll probably wind up chasing either the Hawks or Sharks for playoff position as well.  And the Kings aren’t what they were last year.  No pushovers this time around.

Hopefully the layoff will give them a little more time to get the regulars back and ready to play.  Henrik, after all, is more than halfway past his season best mark of 22 goals in a season.  It’ll be interesting to see what happens when his brother gets back on the ice.