Canucks trying to deal with Chicago's forwards
Predictably, the gifted, brilliant, mercurial Canucks went down in defeat in the sixth game of the second round of the Stanley Cup play-offs last evening. In fact, they lost the game and the series on the same day exactly one year after they lost in six games to the same Chicago Black Hawks in the second round of last year's play-offs.
For those of you out there who care even a little bit, the following lists excuses for why the Canucks lost yet again.
1. The Stanley Cup play-offs are a war of attrition, and the Canucks were beaten up. Most teams play 7 defencemen in the play-offs, and the Canucks were down to three active defencemen last night, one of whom two days before suffered what many believed to be a 'ruptured testicle' after he blocked a shot in front of his net. Yikes. Injured Canuck defencemen include Sami Salo, Alex Edler, Willie Mitchell, Aaron Rome, and Nolan Baumgartner.
2. Roberto Luongo is sometimes a brilliant goalie, and other times very ordinary. In three of the four losses against Chicago, my son Aidan might have stopped more shots than Luongo, and Aidan is a soccer player.
3. Chicago is filled with skilled players who build from the back and come across the blue line in waves. This is an extraordinarily talented hockey team. Many times in this series I sat back and simply marveled at the skill of the Black Hawks. They are a wonder to watch.
4. Chicago is better coached. Joel Quenville knew that the Canucks were hurting on defence, and made sure that his big forwards like Byfuglien (pronounced 'Buff-lin') hit the Canuck's defencemen every chance they got. When Shane O'Brien got cut by a stick across his forward, and then had it glued and stitched so that he could return, a Chicago player sought out O'Brien and punched him right in the stitches. This is simply smart hockey.
5. Next year the Canucks will celebrate 40 years in the NHL, with only two Stanley Cup finals appearances to show for it. Like the Boston Red Sox, the Canucks are cursed. Won't someone please slaughter a goat?
1 comment:
Three (musty) cheers, then, for the Vancouver Millionaires! Still the city's only Stanley Cup champs after 95 years! The legend just keeps on growing. Imagine in five years -- a century of unbeaten Millionaires' excellence! 7 players, no issue of a salary cap in 1915, led by a man named "Cyclone". I get chills just thinking about it.
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