So, what could be better than a Saturday night victory over the Toronto Maple Leafs?  A win over the Oilers as a chaser?  Yep, that would make for a pretty damn good weekend. 

The Canucks played better in the first half of both games, trying hard not to allow a tying goal in the Leafs game, before Mason Raymond managed to finally put the game out of reach after Alex Burrows had hit the post on a shot at an empty net (the *second* time they hit the post after the Leafs pulled Joey McDonald).

It felt like the Canucks were trying to sit on their 2-1 lead, but it became pretty clear that that wasn’t in fact the goal.  They were hanging on for dear life after more failed attempts to get the puck out of their own end than I could count.  Rather weak attempts.  This would have been one of those times that it would have been fine to ice the puck, and then have Alain Vigneault call a time-out to give those stuck on the ice a break.  Yeah, the puck still would have been in the Canucks’ end, but it might have been enough to break the momentum.

Failing that, and I know they’re paranoid about putting the puck over the glass and taking a penalty, but here’s a tip.  Don’t aim for the glass.  Try and scoop the puck up and hit the damn scoreboard.  It’ll get the puck out of the zone, and no chance of taking a penalty because the puck caught the top of the glass.

All in all, a good win, though, with Ryan Kesler also picking up a goal on a great wrist-shot from the point.

And then the Oilers came to town.  Roberto Luongo picked up his first shutout of the season, and 21st as a Canuck to move him past Kirk McLean as the all-time leader in shutouts as a Canuck. 

It wasn’t the typical extremely physical contest when the Oil come to town, but still entertaining.  Michael Grabner bagged his second goal, and Henrik Sedin  managed to tip in a shot from the point and ice the game. 

Neither of the games was particularly thrilling, in my opinion, other than the fact that the Canucks picked up four points.  They were just…wins.  Even with the whole thing in the media about Brian Burke and Mike Gillis, it seems to have been more of a creation of the MSM.  Kind of like when two teams have a brawl filled game and play each other again four or five days later.  The followup game has none of the issues of the first game.  But the MSM makes it sound like WWIII is going to happen.

Meh.

One more home game against the Wings on Tuesday, and then it’s off on a road trip for a bit.  Things appear to have turned the corner, particularly with Luongo, who gives the impression that he’s finally hit his stride after his traditional slow start.

Which is a good thing, because they’ve got some work to do catching the Flames and Avs (!) before the tough work starts after the new year.

So let me get this straight.  Willie Mitchell throws a perfectly legal hit on Johnathan Toews, and gets a penalty for it.  The Canucks have a 2 on 0 breakaway blown dead because Dustin Byfuglien jumps Mitchell.  Beautiful.

Apparently goaltenders don’t need to stop breakaways anymore.  Someone just needs to jump someone behind the play, and things get blown dead.  No more breakaway.

This whole thing lately about a fight breaking out over a clean but hard hit is just pissing me off. It’s a physical game, for God’s sake.  People get hurt.  Just because someone gets hurt from a hit DOESN’T mean it was a dirty hit.

Did the Pens get jumped when Roberto Luongo got hurt last year?  Was there a fight after Daniel Sedin or Sami Salo got hurt earlier this year?  (Okay, bad example on Salo).

Regardless, the Canucks played as close to a complete game as they have in awhile, coming back to beat the Blackhawks for their first road win of the year.  Killing off 5 on 3’s, Michael Grabner getting his first NHL goal, and Mikael Samuelsson chipping in the game winner.

Alain Vigneault has been a little too light on the Canucks (at least in the media) by saying that the Canucks have been out-chancing their opponents two or three to one lately.  Uh, coach?  How many points do you get for outshooting the other team 40 – 20 if you lose 3-1?  That’s right.  NONE.  You need to get chances, but if you don’t finish more of them, you might as well have not had them.

Hopefully the trend continues tonight with a Leafs team that’s had a week off, but is still looking for its first win.  Best thing that they could do?  Jump out to a quick two goal lead to take the pressure off, and then keep driving.  Hell, run up the score.

Because, of course, there’s nothing better than beating the Leafs on national TV.  Until the playoffs start, of course.  Not that the Leafs will be playing in the post season anyway.

Well, that’s not much of a way to win a hockey game.  Considering the fact that the Canucks had a 3-0 lead in the second period, after having held the Flames to only 2 shots in the first period, they shouldn’t have had to go to a shootout to decide it.

Especially considering that they gave up 4 unanswered goals to let the Flames take the lead, before getting *two* goals in the last 15 seconds to force overtime (with the first being waved off, it was up to Daniel Sedin to score with 0.2 seconds left to give the Canucks a chance to keep their unbeaten streak in the preseason alive.

So it kind of figures that it would be Daniel who scored the winner in the shootout, too, doesn’t it?  After the game Alain Vigneault said that Cory Schneider needed to be better, although from what I saw of the game, he didn’t look that bad – one of the Flames goals came about because one of his defensemen backed right into him.  Kind of hard to fault the guy on something like that.

But, when it comes right down to it, the Canucks are still unbeaten in the preseason, and hopefully will be able to ride a streak like this right into the regular season, and get the year started off right.

Could this have been scripted any better?   Alain Vigneault picks two players who are returning to play their former team for the first time to have the chance to win the game in the shootout.  Kyle Wellwood missed, but he wasn’t who the fans really came to see.  Mats Sundin skated in on Vesa Toskala and put a high backhander behind him to win the game, making the Canucks 7 – 1 in the month of February, and extending Roberto Luongo’s personal unbeaten streak to eight games.

Despite the fact that the Canucks got smacked around in the first period, it was good to see that they were able to come from behind yet again to get the win.  But they need to get out of that habit.  Despite what they’ve done recently, they’re not a great come-from-behind kind of team.  And the statistics don’t lie.  The team that scores first has a better chance of picking up the two points.

Alex Burrows continued to show why he’s going to get a rather impressive raise next year, regardless of where he plays.  Sure hope that it’s for the Canucks.   He’s one that they definitely shouldn’t let get away.

One thing that I did before this game that I’ve never done before, was to solicit guest posts from bloggers who cover the Canucks’ opposition.  I contacted a Leafs blogger asking if he wanted to write a post offering his perspective of a Leafs fan seeing Sundin playing for the Canucks.  I didn’t get a response.  This blog was my second choice, too.  The first one in Google had no contact information, and no way to get in touch with the guy who maintains the site.  Oh well.  No links to Leafs blogs, I guess.

Now that this media circus is over, the Canucks can set their sights on sweeping the road-trip with a win over the Canadiens tomorrow night.  They certainly picked the right time to get hot, although it sure would be better if they could close ground on the Flames.  For the moment I think they should forget about the teams chasing them, because as long as the Canucks keep winning, it doesn’t matter what those teams do. 

Go Canucks.

Now that was a game.  Some beautiful hits, a couple of great fights, and a win for the Canucks.  If it wasn’t so stupid for the Predators to be considered a western team, I could get used to the multiple trips to Tennessee each season.

The Canucks steadily outshot the Preds throughout the game, and if it hadn’t been for the Nashville goaltender, this game wouldn’t have been as close as it was.  But the Canucks’ usual problem of taking stupid penalties continued to haunt them in the first period.

And then came the second period.  After Alex Burrows threw a questionable hit, the Canucks wound up with a seven minute powerplay, courtesy of Jason Arnott.  AND THEY DIDN’T SCORE.  How did this happen?  Simple.  They figured that they had a long time to score, so they passed the puck around forever, waiting for the “perfect” opportunity to put the puck in, or for it to just jump into the net on its own.  Whichever.  I’m hoping that Alain Vigneault ripped a strip off of everyone who plays on the powerplay, because they didn’t even really get that many good chances during the whole thing.  Not as many as they should have, anyway.  Just shoot the damn puck.  PLEASE.

Just one game left on the road trip from hell, though, and the Canucks have a chance to break even on the thing when they play the Oilers on Saturday night.  They’re actually getting on the plane tonight in Nashville and flying home to Vancouver, before heading out to Edmonton on Friday.  Not a bad idea, actually, allowing the team to sleep in their own beds for the first time in a couple of weeks.  Stupid scheduling.

There’s talk that Roberto Luongo may be back to play against the Oilers, and it’ll be interesting to see how tentative he might be, trying to avoid re-aggrivating the injury that’s sidelined him for the last three weeks.  Or to see how rusty he might (or might not) be.

After the blowout on Wednesday night, the best thing that you could hope for is that Alain Vigneault kicked some asses around the dressing room and was able to change the focus of the Canucks. Because focus was something that they definitely didn’t have.

Next up is a home-and-home with the Oilers that starts in Alberta tonight. Thankfully both games are televised, because radio is getting less and less interesting. At least when the opposition scores two goals in 13 seconds, it is.

Ryan Kesler is going to play, sore jaw and all. It’ll be interesting to see who Vigneault puts with the Sedins after Ryan Shannon got banished to Manitoba.

Prediction tonight is 3-1 for the Canucks, and 3-2 tomorrow night, also for Vancouver.