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End of an era? The time is now for core Canucks

Posted on April 30, 2013 by admin in Province Hockey | No comments

Henrik Sedin said it hits home when he looks at the pictures in his family photo album.

In the early years, the faces are rounder and the hair is more plentiful. There might be a girlfriend or two at the team functions, but mostly, it’s just this group of players taking their first uncertain steps together.

Then the girlfriends become wives. Then the kids start to appear. Then, before you know it, seven years have passed and you’ve accomplished everything you set out to accomplish, except for one thing. And you think about it. You think about what it means and if this will be the last chance with the guys you grew up with, the guys who’ve built something in Vancouver but are now in danger of being remembered for the one thing they didn’t do instead of everything they did.

“We talk it about it pretty much everyday here,” Henrik said. “This is home for us. It’s special that...

Both Canucks and Sharks fans braced to cry in their beer

Posted on April 29, 2013 by admin in Province Hockey | No comments

The scene is a sports bar on the Oregon coast, equidistant between San Jose and Vancouver.

A man sits at the bar. He’s wearing a teal blue jersey with the name Makarov stitched on the back. He’s joined by a man wearing the classic original Canucks’ jersey with the name Lever on the back.

The first man nods to his new companion.

“That time of year again,” he says.

“I know,” says the man in the Canucks’ gear. “I never know if I should be excited or just prepare myself for the inevitable. It hurts less that way.”

“Tell me about it. We’ve been runners-up more times than Susan Lucci. We’re always there. We’re just never there at the end. It gets to you after a while.”

“Hah. We wrote the book on heartbreak. You know what team has played the most playoff games in the last five years? That’s right, Bubba. Your Vancouver Canucks. And you know how many Stanley Cups we have...

Willes on Luongo’s legacy: He made the Canucks relevant

Posted on April 25, 2013 by admin in Province Hockey | No comments

The day of his last start in Vancouver, Vol XXIV, Roberto Luongo wasn’t in a particularly reflective or nostalgic mood.

“Reminiscing is for when you retire,” the Canucks’ goalie said before Thursday night’s game with the Anaheim Ducks.

And you can understand that. Given the way this season has gone, it’s just as likely Cory Schneider’s “injury” turns into an incurable foot fungus and Luongo is called on to the lead the Canucks into the playoffs.

But there was also something in air on Thursday, something that seemed to call for an accounting of Luongo’s career in Vancouver which, when you think about it, takes in a lot of territory.

There have been better players in the franchise’s history. There’ve certainly been more popular players. But, in his seven seasons here, there’s never been as important a player as the goalie from Montreal.

There are any number of ways to measure Luongo’s impact on the Canucks. The most meaningful? His first five years,...

Willes: NHL needs to get back to rules of hockey

Posted on April 23, 2013 by admin in Province Hockey | No comments

Henrik Sedin might not be the most objective source on the subject so, even if he’s 100-per-cent right, you can take his views with a grain of salt.

“Yes, absolutely,” the Canucks captain answered when asked if the officiating standard has changed this season.

“I think it’s too late now, but going into next season you’ve got to go back to the last lockout where they called everything. Guys are going to stop hooking if they know they’re going to get called. Right now there’s way too much of that.”

Kerry Fraser, on the other hand, is a more objective source on this subject and he sees the same things. In 30 years as a referee, Fraser called more than 2,000 regular-season and playoff games and was working right after the 2004-05 lockout when, in a stunning development, the game was called by the rulebook. That era now is referred to as the “good old days,” in hockey circles.

“I would have...

Ed Willes: Hawks are still pick of the litter, but Canucks’ glimmer brightening

Posted on April 23, 2013 by admin in Province Hockey | No comments

This season there's one fundamental question in the Western Conference: Can anyone beat the Chicago Blackhawks?

And here's the fundamental answer to that fundamental question: If anyone can, they've done a crummy job of proving it to the rest of the league.

The Hawks, of course, are having a better 2013 than the stock market. Seventy-three points in 45 games. Twenty-four and, until recently, 11-game unbeaten streaks. Six frickin' regulation losses to date. If you extrapolate their record over 82 games its 133 points which is just stupid. As it is, their only problem these days might be finding a reason to play even if a Canucks-Hawks matchup generally provides it's own motivation.

“Blackhawks, Canucks,” said Alain Vigneault. “That's all you've got to say.”

Well, after Monday night, you can say a few more things.

While it's hard to know how much weight to attach to the Canucks' performance against the NHL's best team, what they did offer in their 3-1 win was...

Willes: Canucks’ Sedins falling off top-scoring list

Posted on March 29, 2013 by admin in Province Hockey | No comments

The Sedin twins have never measured themselves by numbers but, given the data they accumulated over the previous three NHL seasons, they're aware you shouldn't need a depth probe to find them in the league scoring race.

But they can't hide from this one. So they don't bother trying. Before last night's game with the Colorado Avalanche, Henrik, the 2009-10 Art Ross Trophy winner, was 31st in the NHL in scoring and Daniel, the 2010-11 Art Ross winner, was 44th.

“We know we have to score,” Henrik said. “We don't play (penalty killing). Power-play and five-one-five scoring is our job. We know we have to score more.”

And they did on Thursday night. Hell, against the Avs, they lit it up. Daniel snapped out of a four-game scoring drought with a vengeance, potting the game-winner midway through the third period and drawing an assist on Alex Burrows' first-period goal. Henrik, for his part, drew a helper on Burrows' goal and added...

Willes: Luongo’s conduct is that of a consummate pro

Posted on March 27, 2013 by admin in Province Hockey | No comments

Roberto Luongo stood in front of the microphones and TV cameras on Wednesday and answered the same questions he’s been asked since Goalie Confidential started its long run in Vancouver.

The line of interrogation was largely the same. The answers? They were the same, too.

True, with the NHL trade deadline now just six days away, the context changed. But if you were expecting to hear anything new from the Canucks’ goalie, you were in the wrong place.

And that’s kind of the point. Luongo stood in there and answered everything thrown his way just as he’s done since the lockout ended.

It wasn’t especially revealing. It certainly wasn’t dramatic. But it was sincere and it was delivered in an honest, direct manner which, in the end, is all you can ask of the man.

Luongo, one of the three or four best goalies of his generation, has been placed in an impossible situation, but he’s managed to make it all seem normal.

His...

Willes: Vigneault was right, Canucks had the better netminder tonight — but will it last?

Posted on March 19, 2013 by admin in Province Hockey | No comments

Before his team temporarily put an end to the hysteria sweeping the land, Alain Vigneault stood in front of the media and identified the key to his team’s chances against the St. Louis Blues.

“I’ve got to be able to come here after the game and say my goaltender was better than their goaltender,” the Canucks head coach/lightning rod said.

Now, as far as revelations go, this one wasn’t particularly blinding. It demonstrated, in fact, a sports writers’ grasp of the obvious. The problem has been, during their recent descent to the seventh ring of hell, the Canucks have had the second-best goalie on too many nights which helps explain why they were enduring one of the worst stretches of the Vigneault era.

Until Tuesday night, at least.

We’ll know soon enough if Cory Schneider just had one of those nights or this was the start of the long-awaited stretch when one of the Canucks’ keepers takes control of the net. But,...

Willes: Low-key Canucks-Sharks fixture shows how West has fallen into mediocrity

Posted on March 6, 2013 by admin in Province Hockey | No comments

Two years ago, when the Canucks and Sharks were having a fairly intense argument over who was the alpha team in the Western Conference, the city would have stopped for Tuesday night’s matchup.

Remember? In 2010-11, the Canucks and Sharks finished 1-2 in the West with 117 and 105 points respectively, then met in the Conference final.

They also played one of the great regular-season games in recent memory, a 5-4 Canucks shootout win in San Jose on March 10 that should be put in a time vault.

The rivalry had everything: stars, scoring, emotion, a raw edge which made it appointment viewing.

That, we remind you, was just two years ago. Geez, what happened?

While there remains something compelling at the heart of the Canucks-Sharks rivalry, they’re no longer the heavyweight title bouts of a few years back.

Both teams, in fact, seem to have settled into that great, grey middle class in the West which featured nine teams within three points of...

Willes: NHL hockey fights are on the rise in this post-lockout world

Posted on February 22, 2013 by admin in Province Hockey | No comments

Since NHL teams reconvened after their three-and-a-half-month Gary sabbatical, it’s been noted that fighting is on the rise this season.

This development, perforce, sparks any one of a number of debates about fighting’s role in the game; about the league’s tacit endorsement of fighting and various other themes which have become all-too familiar and more than a little tiring. The plain fact is that fighting is part of what the NHL is trying to sell, and that doesn’t appear to be changing any time soon.

What’s changing, however, is who’s doing the fighting, and that has fundamentally altered the way the game is played. This is also pertinent to the Canucks, because it appears the Presidents’ Trophy winners are part of fighting’s new face, and for fans who are still traumatized by the image of professional rat Brad Marchand speed-bagging Daniel Sedin in the 2011 Stanley Cup final, this is not unwelcome news.

“We’re team-tough,” said defenceman Kevin Bieksa. “We don’t...

Willes: Henrik is Canucks’ all-time scoring leader because of his work in weight room

Posted on February 16, 2013 by admin in Province Hockey | No comments

VANCOUVER — Henrik Sedin isn’t exactly expansive when the subject is himself. But to understand what Friday night’s milestone meant to the Canucks’ captain, you just had to look at his face.

No, really. Look at his face.

When the twins first arrived in Vancouver, they both had the cuddly, rounded aspect of cherubs. They weren’t exactly chubby, but they were soft; softer than eider down, softer than cappuccino foam. Not only did that make them ill-suited for the NHL’s rigours, it basically made them plush toys for Adam Foote, Rob Blake and assorted other Western Conference blueliners.

“A lot of guys used to abuse us,” his brother Daniel fondly recounts. ”We didn’t start working out in the gym until we were 16 years old. We knew it was going to take time after those first two years. We knew we had to put in a lot of work in the summer to get to where we wanted to be.

“And we...

Willes: Parallels with Patriots not lost on Canucks goalie Schneider

Posted on January 23, 2013 by admin in Province Hockey | No comments

Back in the 2001 NFL season, a 15-year-old Cory Schneider watched a similar situation unfold with his beloved New England Patriots.

The Patriots started that season with Drew Bledsoe as their quarterback. A four-time Pro Bowler, Bledsoe led the Pats to the ‘97 Super Bowl before losing to Green Bay but could never quite get his team over the hump. Prior to 2001, he also signed a 10-year, $103-million contract.

Let’s see. Respected veteran, Couldn’t quite deliver the goods. Big contract. Last name ends in a vowel. We trust you can draw the parallel here.

Bledsoe was also seriously injured in the second game of 2001, creating an opportunity for the Pats’ young backup, a kid out of Michigan named Tom Brady. Brady, of course, led the Pats to a Super Bowl victory over St. Louis in New Orleans and that offseason – note, OFFSEASON - Bledsoe was traded to Buffalo.

“I remember that,” Schneider said on Wednesday, as the Canucks...

Willes: Luongo Twitter theorists add little to trade saga

Posted on June 25, 2012 by admin in Province Hockey | No comments

The least you can say about Monday’s report concerning Roberto Luongo’s preferred destination is it passes the smell test.

As for a more rigorous test of its veracity, sorry. This is the age of Twitter. When information is passed along in 140character missives there are bound to be holes. And this item left a few questions unanswered.

“There are a lot of stories out there,” said Luongo’s agent Gilles Lupien. “That’s why I don’t pick up the phone. I don’t want to create any new ones.”

No, that will fall to others. But the latest report did create a fresh talking point to this tired story and, in this market, that development can’t be ignored.

On Monday, Aaron Portzline of the Columbus Post-Dispatch tweeted that Luongo, to this point, had declined to waive his no-trade clause to the Blackhawks or Leafs and was using that clause to steer a trade toward the Panthers.

This, naturally, inspired a flood of stories from the various...

Stanley Cup Final: LA Kings skating to Cinderella-story finish

Posted on June 4, 2012 by admin in Province Hockey | No comments

With Game 3 of the Stanley Cup final set for tonight, here’s something else few are paying attention to: the Monday morning musings and meditations on the world of sports.

■ As much as the L.A. Kings seem to be writing an impossible Cinderella story, we invite you to go back a couple of years to the spring of 2010 and consider the Kings’ team the Vancouver Canucks met in the playoffs.

That year, the Kings — and their young nucleus of Anze Kopitar, Dustin Brown, Drew Doughty and Jonathan Quick — gave the Canucks everything they could handle in their opening-round series. It was hard to know what they would become but, at the very least, all four looked like developing stars. As it happens, all four have taken the next step in their careers and are now franchise players.

Now, if you would have added Mike Richards and Jeff Carter to that mix — who both played on the...