An impressive comeback win for the Vancouver Canucks against the Oilers in Edmonton on Friday night either showed a glimmer of hope for Vancouver’s playoff chances or it proves the high-flying Oilers club still isn’t quite ready for primetime. Maybe it’s a little of both.
Either/or, it was still an impressive gutsy performance by a Canucks team that could have quit after falling behind two-nothing after one period.
Canucks Horvat
“I’m really proud of the guys the way they stepped up,” Canucks captain Bo Horvat said postgame. “It’s not an easy back-to-back for us with the travel, and time change, and everything going on, so for us to play the way we did tonight, obviously it wasn’t the best start, but we finished strong and “Deals” obviously played unbelievable for us tonight.”
“Deals” being Canucks goaltender Collin Delia, getting his first ever start for the club. He turned away 31 of 33 Edmonton Oiler shots and kept the first period deficit from being much worse.
“Just belief,” Delia said. “Belief in each other. We’ve got a good group here and granted I haven’t been here too long, but times like those galvanize a team and I thought it was really good to see the character of our group hold together there and came up with some big blocks and big goals at the end there. That was nice.”
It was just his 2nd appearance for the Canucks and just the 34th in the 28-year-old California native’s NHL career. His performance will give head coach Bruce Boudreau something to think about when the Canucks meet the San Jose Sharks at Rogers Arena next week after the league’s Christmas break.
Let’s Skate!
Vancouver Hockey Insider sat down with NHL Deputy Commissioner Bill Daly on Friday to discuss a variety of topics and one of the more annoying ones is the concept of changing the Stanley Cup playoff format to add more teams. No thanks! As we learn in this three-minute clip.
See the full interview by clicking here.
World Juniors start on the 26th, the NHL returns on the 27th. In the meantime …
Merry Christmas!!
