Canucks Sunday:
I tend to be a bit long winded on Sunday 9’s, because I like to be thorough with stories, especially when they involve tales from ‘old time hockey’. Today I’m limiting the verbiage.
Here goes …
1) Tampa’s star power took over on Sunday afternoon in the Lightning’s 4-2 win over the Canucks. It was close, but ultimately Nikita Kucherov (3 points) and Brayden Point (4 points) made the difference. The Bolts scored the game winner on the power play with less than four minutes remaining in regulation. Jake Guentzel notched it, his top linemates had the assists.
“Special teams won the game for them, and their best players,” Canucks head coach Rick Tocchet said after. “It’s tough to kill penalties with those types of star players.”
How does Vancouver account for a 4-6-and-3 record this season at Rogers Arena? Losing a game because of a too-many-men-on-the-ice penalty late in the 3rd period would be one example.
2) Quinn Hughes should be a Hart Trophy candidate as well as an obvious top contender for the Norris Trophy this season. After getting clipped in the face, leaking all over, hitting the dressing room for repairs and missing half of the 1st period, he came back and scored a sneaky goal on the backhand through traffic at 16:08 to open the scoring.
3) The next time Seattle Kraken GM Ron Francis makes the playoffs will be the 2nd time he’s made the playoffs as an NHL GM.
4) The New York Rangers, who lost to the Kraken 7-5 earlier on Sunday, appeared as though they might still be a bit discombobulated following the trading of their captain and hard-hitting, veteran D-man Jacob Trouba to the Anaheim Ducks on Friday for 25-year-old lefty D-man Urho Vaakanainen and a conditional 2025 4th-round NHL Draft pick.
The Rangers leveraged Trouba, some have referred to it as “blackmailed”, by threatening him with waivers if he didn’t lift his no trade clause. The turmoil surrounding his potential move had apparently been bubbling for at least a couple of weeks.
With the freed up money, the club gave top goaltender Igor Shesterkin a new eight-year contract worth $92-million on Saturday. His back-up, former two-time Stanley Cup champion Jonathan Quick, took the loss to the Kraken on Sunday.
New York blew a 3-1 lead in the 2nd period. They failed to cover men in their own zone and they lost puck battles repeatedly. Things are awry in Gotham for a team not playing up to its talent level.
5) Social media had some irritating fun on Sunday with the rumour that Detroit Red Wings captain Dylan Larkin had requested a trade out of Motown. Stay tuned. The reports up until now have mostly been shot down as erroneous.
Speaking of Larkin, if one were to apply the qualifications for the NHL’s annual Hart Trophy winner, “the player deemed most valuable to his team”, then the Michigan native and former Wolverine collegian would be a finalist every year. The Red Wings seem to be nothing without him in the line-up.
Nathan MacKinnon won the award in 2024, deservedly so, but by the letter of the law, or in this award’s case, if the language was applied as written, it wouldn’t or shouldn’t always just go to the guy the writers deem “the league MVP”.
Also, to truly be considered for practical purposes, the dude’s team needs to make the playoffs, although again, it’s a regular season award and reaching the postseason technically shouldn’t be a factor.
6) Canucks trivia slot: Do you know which player, who presently leads his NHL team in scoring, was a teammate of Keifer Sherwood with the Youngstown Phantoms in the USHL? Answer at the bottom.
7) Surprisingly, at first glance, the Kraken are just three points behind the Canucks in the Pacific Division standings. Upon further review, one will notice that Vancouver has three games in-hand on their southern neighbours.
The Canucks are also a deeper, better hockey team, one that’s suffered through a number of serious maladies/absences this season.
8) Google/find Jeff Marek, The Sheet.
My old pal with whom I’ve crossed paths with on television and radio over the last two decades as guests on each other’s shows, has cranked up his new program/podcast. The former Sportsnet/Hockey Night in Canada, etc. etc. personality is back in action. Dude’s an encyclopedia of pucks. Look him up and tune in.
9) Remind me to tell you about the time I was driving back to BC after a Canucks/Kraken preseason game in Spokane and ran into a thundering herd of elk, among other things. That’s next week …
Trivia Answer: Kyle Connor, who presently leads the Winnipeg Jets in scoring, and did so in three of the last five seasons, played three full seasons in Youngstown, ending in 2014-’15.
Recent “Kraken Canuckleheads” podcast you might find informative and entertaining … (subtitled: ‘What the hell’s wrong with the Predators”) …
Enjoy the Hockey Action!!!
