The Canucks are hanging out in Winnipeg, brrrrr, while awaiting Tuesday night’s finale to their five-game road trip. So far the club is 1-1-and-2 on this latest puck adventure and sits in the 2nd Western Conference wild card spot with 48 points.
Alrightee then …
1) Elias Pettersson remains the most fascinating player to watch for Vancouver. Petey returned to the line-up on Friday evening against the Carolina Hurricanes and of course played again Saturday night against the Maple Leafs in Toronto. In his first matches back since leaving the line-up December 23rd, he didn’t record a shot-on-goal.
In fact, on Friday night, in 20+ minutes of ice time, he didn’t record a significant stat of any kind, other than minus-1 and 46.7% at the face-off dot.
Saturday saw a boost in involvement despite four fewer minutes of ice time. He delivered a hit, blocked five shots and tallied an assist on the opening goal of the 3-0 victory over the Leafs. Oddly, he generated the exact same face-off success rate; 46.7%.
2) Team Canada won Gold against the United States at the Under-18 Women’s Worlds in Finland with a 3-0 victory on Sunday. Not exactly World Juniors, but every win matters, particularly as the women’s game continues to gain popularity and involvement.
3) Ray Bourque hosted one of my book launches back in 2008 as his restaurant in the North End of Boston. I hadn’t run into the all-time leading scorer among NHL defenceman since a party in Chicago before the 2019 Winter Classic in South Bend, Indiana. We finally caught up a bit on Friday, among other things giving us an opportunity to talk about Canucks captain Quinn Hughes.
If you missed it earlier today … here’s the story.
By the way, aside from being a great hockey player, “Borkie” is hilarious. We did share a bus for a weekend on a tour with a bunch of NHL alum’ and his sense of humour is what really jumped out. We’ll be grabbing him for a “Krackin’ Canuckleheads” podcast in the not-so-distant future.
4) Any argument that the Nashville Predators are the biggest disappointment of this NHL season and the Washington Capitals are the biggest positive surprise?
Noted; the Columbus Blue Jackets are making a little push for that latter category.
5) My occasionally bizarre intuition is still thinking it has a chance this season with the preseason prediction of the Vancouver Canucks winning the 2025 Stanley Cup Final. No math involved, no hard core analysis, just a spontaneous gut feeling or sixth sense, that I reckon comes from almost six decades around the sport.
Aside from bizarre accuracy with game scores, it predicted during preseason 2015 that Artemi Panarin would win the Calder Trophy over Connor McDavid, that Alexander Ovechkin would reach 900 goals, (both of those on a national talk show), and telling Brad Treliving in 2015, and more than once, that he would someday be the General Manager of the Toronto Maple Leafs.
Now HERE’S the twist! I also told “Tree” that he would win a Stanley Cup as GM with Toronto. What if the two gut instinct flashes collide?! Canucks – Maple Leafs Stanley Cup Final this season?! Oh my!!
Better than that for all concerned, and for the weird accuracy of that internal tinge; would be if the Canucks won it this season and the Maple Leafs the next?
OK. Feel free to commence the mushroom jokes. 😂
6) Trivia Time: Which former Canucks General Manager held that position the longest?
(answer after number-9 below)
7) The Hurricanes hoisted Eric Staal’s number-12 to the rafters in a ceremony on Sunday. The former 2nd-overall pick (2003 behind goalie Marc-Andre Fleury to the Penguins) played 12 seasons in Carolina, seven of them as captain.
Although his club only made the playoffs twice during that period, they did of course reach the pinnacle in 2006.
“Overall, the memory that I have of being a Hurricane is being a champion,” Staal said. “I won a Stanley Cup. I only won one, and that’s not easy to win, and I won it here. There’s nothing better than that.”
As an ice-level, live TV game reporter in those days, while being impressed with just how quick Staal was, I mostly recall paying attention to how hard he worked.
Three others Canes’ sweaters have been raised: Glen Wesley’s number-2, Ron Francis’s number-10, and current head coach Rod Brind’Amour’s number-17.
8) Quickie question: Do you know who Leevi Meriläinen is yet?
9) Feel free to give us a follow on twitter @simmerpuck, which happens to be the same name as my Youtube channel. There’s a Canucks drill video below. Click on subscribe if you want — it’s painless and free. Thank you very much.
You can also comment on these stories and questions inside this website or via e-mail.
I’ve also linked a couple of earlier “Simmer Sunday 9’s” below, because much of the material is evergreen. Enjoy the Hockey Action!!
Trivia Answer: Pat Quinn was GM of the Canucks longer than anyone else, from June 1st, 1987 to November 4th, 1997. He was also team president during that time period and served as head coach for a portion as well.
Earlier Canucks:
— Canucks Tocchet A Throwback; Has Adapted
— Simmer’s Sunday 9; Media Hate, Miller And Pettersson
— Simmer’s Sunday 9; The Sky Is Falling; Diver
— Canucks Drills with Demko on Youtube …