News

Canucks Post-Game #Sixpack - Kassian and Edler have funny faces

DH Vancouver Staff
DH Vancouver Staff
|
Dec 19 2017, 8:52 pm
Canucks Post-Game #Sixpack - Kassian and Edler have funny faces

You’d have to be clueless not to know what the biggest story in Thursday’s Canucks game was going to be.

The player involved in the NHL’s trade of the summer was playing against his old team…

No need to waste any more time – might as well report what Luca Sbisa accomplished against the Ducks: 0 points, 0 assist, 1 shot on goal, and a minus-1 rating.

Funny thing is Ryan Kesler’s stats read 0, 0, minus-1 too (if you care about him). Turned out, the game wasn’t really about Sbisa. Or Kesler.

Canucks fans, if you’re reading the 4-3 score (they lost in a shootout) and worrying about the loss, don’t. Vancouver dominated. Corsi for stats were 62-49 for the Canucks. They may not have got the win but if they play like this every night they’ll win many more than they lose.

1. Since stats are cool now

Here are the game’s shot attempts from war-on-ice.com.

shotchartananov20s

You can see Vancouver dominated from the start of the game, but do notice that the Ducks were slightly better in the third, and much better in overtime. Course, the Canucks were coming off a back-to-back while the Ducks were well-rested.

The Ducks were nearly as dominant in OT as Eddie Lack, who nearly stole another win from Anaheim.

While Corey Perry’s corsi +/- was plus-5 at the end of the game, the Canucks had 7 players with a higher corsi +/-. Henrik led with a plus-12.

2. Kesler

Kesler didn’t do much. His corsi +/- was minus-7 in the game. He didn’t score on his shootout attempt. Maybe all the booing got to him.

Or maybe this was what slowed Kes down.

Unfortunately Kesler got the last laugh as his team won this round.

3. Can’t blame Lack

Eddie Lack played yet another great game against Anaheim, but this time he didn’t get the win. Worse, he had 3 goals scored on him. But if you look at them, you’ll see he had no chance on a single one:

Cogliano’s goal – a cross-ice pass from Jacob Silfverberg to Andrew Cogliano = no chance for Lack:

coglianogoal

Getzlaf’s goal – a top-corner, perfectly-placed backhand shot:

getzlaf

Beleskey’s goal – Vatanen’s shot, tipped by Getzlaf, sitting on the doorstep for Beleskey:

beleskeygoal

We agree they weren’t Lack’s fault, then?

4. Horvat’s first

Bo Horvat was slated to be a healthy scratch Thursday, but right before the game we found out Alex Burrows wouldn’t play.

Horvat didn’t pass up the opportunity. He scored his first NHL goal in the second period – check out the Henrik-like pass by Derek Dorsett to set him up.

horvatgoal

He followed that goal up by playing his first penalty kill shift in the NHL, and playing five big shifts in the third.

By the end of the game, Horvat was taking key offensive draws against Kesler and winning them, and he led the Canucks in faceoff win percentage going 9-5 on the night.

5. This doesn’t look right

Sportsnet’s graphic for the three stars at the end of the game:

edler3star

Yeah, that’s not Alex Edler’s face – it’s Brian Elliott’s. Good response from Liana:

Also, Zack Kassian doesn’t take getting stitched up like a man.

kassstiched

He was hit by a flipped puck in the middle of the third, btw.

6. Some excellent tweets

I wanted to alert Rob, our editor, about a some suggestions Mike was giving me on boosting the Sixpack. Mike’s reply…

Radim Vrbata lost the puck on his shootout attempt. This was so bad it was good:

So bad

Get it

Man I crack myself up

Note: thanks to @myregularface for providing the gifs used in this post.

DH Vancouver StaffDH Vancouver Staff
+ News

SUBSCRIBE TO THE HIVE

Get the latest news sent to your inbox and stay in the loop