[PGT] Vancouver Canucks at New Jersey Devils | Feb. 06, 2023

[CanucksJay]

Well it's only been game 1 but same old Canucks. 

Lots of goals no defense. 

Probably could have benefitted from Horvat's faceoffs but that's about the only difference I saw tonight. 

If the team is the same whether it's Horvat or Beauvillier 

I guess I'm ok that we added Raty and a first on top of that. 

Myers looked really good in the beginning of the game. 

The guy is good when he just plays a boring low event game and doesn't try to generate or do too much. 

He started pinching and getting more aggressive and then started running around. 

 

Stillman is terrible. Great he got an assist but his in decisiveness and late/slow processing ended up giving up the blue line more than he had to. Problem is, that's what he is. He's a fringe 7D and that's what we are seeing. 

 

Podz has a great game. He's going to be one of RTs favorites. 

 

Watching yesterday reaffirmed we need help on the blue line

 

Bear Hughes d combo is terrible. 

Schenn is the man. 

OEL is fine. He is honestly the best all around D man we have. 

Unfortunate we are paying him 7+ but he's definitely at minimum a 5+

 

Team's not gonna get better until D improves. 

Myers needs to play safe boring hockey

OEL is a 5m D man and needs to be paired with a other 5-6m D and play on the 2nd pairing

 

Bear is a 6D and should not be playing with Hughes. He should be playing with a steady guy like Schenn. 

 

Hughes is a 1-2D and needs a true top pairing partner. 

I don't think a Severson will get it done. I dunno maybe you really need to think about trading Hughes for a bonafide blue liner who doesn't need to be sheltered by his d partner. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited February 7, 2023 by CanucksJay

[Alflives]

34 minutes ago, Plaguez said:

OEL has probably the softest shot I have ever seen, just floats them add to that his lack of foot speed, he'd be terrible for the 1st unit.  I'd rather have Hughes out there.  

Too bad Hughes couldn't play the whole game.  He can carry any partner.  

[CanucksJay]

1 minute ago, Alflives said:

Too bad Hughes couldn't play the whole game.  He can carry any partner.  

I dunno.. 

 

I Thought Hughes and Bear looked very poor in their own zone or in defensive transition. 

 

Hughes needs a really good partner... 

If he did, they would prob log 28min a night and look solid. 

 

[Alflives]

1 minute ago, CanucksJay said:

I dunno.. 

 

I Thought Hughes and Bear looked very poor in their own zone or in defensive transition. 

 

Hughes needs a really good partner... 

If he did, they would prob log 28min a night and look solid. 

 

I'd like to see Hughes carry the puck up ice (and attack) with the same speed he showed chasing down his brother.  He's so careful to not get caught up ice, because he can trust his partner.  When we had Tanev, Hughes could move up ice more.  

[DownUndaCanuck]

14 minutes ago, CanucksJay said:

I dunno.. 

 

I Thought Hughes and Bear looked very poor in their own zone or in defensive transition. 

 

Hughes needs a really good partner... 

If he did, they would prob log 28min a night and look solid. 

 

Just shows that this team is so far away from being considered a decent team. We've got Stillman (Chicago's 7th man), Bear (Carolina's 7-8th defenceman) and Schenn (Tampa's 7th guy like two years ago) all playing big minutes for us. Our defence is literally the NHL's waste bucket.

 

Meanwhile our offence is so good our 2nd line center just got traded and became another team's 1st line center.

 

We've got such a mess of good and bad players on this team and so far management have done nothing to fix the balance.

 

Realistically, we need to keep Hughes, get rid of Myers and get a couple of bonified 20+ minute NHL top-4 defencemen, then let OEL play as the 4th guy. Bear and Schenn and Dermott and Rathbone/Burroughs can muddle out the bottom-6, that's not as important. Top-4 defences are what make and break teams. Look at teams like Carolina - their bottom pairing is trash. So is Washington's. Even Boston's isn't that strong. But their top-4s are so superb, and they play most of the game anyway. Our top-4 is full of old parts and other team's leftovers.

 

How we do that is up to management, but that's what we need realistically - Myers out, two D-men in. We can't and won't be a playoff team until we fix the top-4 and stop relying on cheap trades and other team's trash to lift us up.

[Nucker 67]

Didn't go through all 13 pages, so not sure if this was brought up. During intermission they had a mock trade to discuss. 

 

I believe the fake trade was:

 

to NJ - Hughes

to VAN - Mercer, Nemec, 1st

 

Do you do it?  I don't think so. Maybe if they added another D

[Ghostsof1915]

I'd love to see Hughes traded for a player like Dobson or Clarke.  We'd lose some offence. But the size and defensive ability would make up for it. We need players to work together to be defensively responsible and cut our goals against. Making the team miserable to play against because they play like Schenn as a wrecking ball would be great too.

I don't think it's just we have two sub-par goalies. We have a sub-par defence and defensive system.

[-Vintage Canuck-]

 

[combover]

this Team needs to start all over sell sell sell 

we aren’t good enough we aren’t one or two pieces away.

This should be the year to go all in on building a future cup contender. Sell everyone and anyone. 

we are barely a one line team with two quality defenders 

 

doing the same things over and expect different results 

the Francesco circus of stupid.(since2012)

as captured in this rare photo of Francesco delivering  the “mandated plan” to president and gms. 

 

 

 

Edited February 7, 2023 by combover

[-Vintage Canuck-]

 

[Tyndall2]

Myers is totally lost in his own end.  

[Dr. Crossbar]

The tank is still on. But anyone who watched that game saw a ton of jump and effort from the Canucks. It wasn't perfect but there were a lot of positives. It really wasn't wet blanket.

[-Vintage Canuck-]

 

[grumpyone]

overall I thought we played a decent game( minus 2 minutes )

we had some jump and were able to gain access to the offensive zone without a dozen tries or just dumping it in ALL THE TIME. 

defence is still an issue, but seemed overall better. the reffing didn't help the PK much. alot of missed calls plus soft calls too. 

was surprized that Tocchet didn't call a time out after that second of the 3 quick goals were scored to settle the team down. But he might have been wanting to see how the team responds on their own. 

the team chemistry without Bo will take a few games to gel. Plus if there are more trades to happen, it will take even longer. 

 

Boeser was invisible last night.

Podz was flying, and driving hard to the net.

the 4th line was working hard and scored ... that's a good sign.

I thought that JT was meh, not bad but not outstanding either.

[DownUndaCanuck]

3 minutes ago, -Vintage Canuck- said:

 

As good as Petey is, I think Tocchet is going to lean on him hard. They're a good fit, coach and player, and watching the ice-time I think Miller's going to be forced to be this team's top line center with Bo gone now. Hopefully that'll take some pressure of Petey so he can keep playing his way.

[Gawdzukes]

1 hour ago, Alflives said:

Will we see guys stand up for one another (like Tanev and Dube did against Trouba) when they need to now that the “elephant” in the room is gone?  Dube is small and soft, half Horvat’s size, and he didn’t hesitate.  

[EdgarM]

1 hour ago, Plaguez said:

OEL has probably the softest shot I have ever seen, just floats them add to that his lack of foot speed, he'd be terrible for the 1st unit.  I'd rather have Hughes out there.  

He produced when Hughes went down to injury recently. The PP didn't look as predictable and I don't think Hughes has any more of a harder shot then OEL. OEL does have a knack for getting the puck to the net though, something the first PP lacks at times.

[combover]

Scouting the Devils and Canucks

James Nichols: Scouts listed to attend last night’s New Jersey Devils – Vancouver Canucks game: Nashville Predators (2), Los Angeles Kings, Pittsburgh Penguins, Anaheim Ducks, Philadelphia Flyers, St. Louis Blues, Columbus Blue Jackets, Ottawa Senators, Winnipeg Jets, San Jose Sharks, Dallas Stars, Chicago Blackhawks, and the Vancouver Canucks

 

 

 

would be interesting if we had a thread that could keep a list of which team scouts at each game. 
 

Edited February 7, 2023 by combover

[Gawdzukes]

1 hour ago, CanucksJay said:

Well it's only been game 1 but same old Canucks. 

Lots of goals no defense. 

Probably could have benefitted from Horvat's faceoffs but that's about the only difference I saw tonight. 

If the team is the same whether it's Horvat or Beauvillier 

I guess I'm ok that we added Raty and a first on top of that. 

Myers looked really good in the beginning of the game. 

The guy is good when he just plays a boring low event game and doesn't try to generate or do too much. 

He started pinching and getting more aggressive and then started running around. 

 

Stillman is terrible. Great he got an assist but his in decisiveness and late/slow processing ended up giving up the blue line more than he had to. Problem is, that's what he is. He's a fringe 7D and that's what we are seeing. 

 

Podz has a great game. He's going to be one of RTs favorites. 

 

Watching yesterday reaffirmed we need help on the blue line

 

Bear Hughes d combo is terrible. 

Schenn is the man. 

OEL is fine. He is honestly the best all around D man we have. 

Unfortunate we are paying him 7+ but he's definitely at minimum a 5+

 

Team's not gonna get better until D improves. 

Myers needs to play safe boring hockey

OEL is a 5m D man and needs to be paired with a other 5-6m D and play on the 2nd pairing

 

Bear is a 6D and should not be playing with Hughes. He should be playing with a steady guy like Schenn. 

 

Hughes is a 1-2D and needs a true top pairing partner. 

I don't think a Severson will get it done. I dunno maybe you really need to think about trading Hughes for a bonafide blue liner who doesn't need to be sheltered by his d partner. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This entire team hinges on fixing the defence. Myers, Stillman, Bear, Dermott, are pure rubbish. Schenn plays the game the right way and can be a #6 in a pinch, but he's slow and ventilates  goals too.

[Boudrias]

4 hours ago, Elias Pettersson said:

Who cares Wai, we are on team tank.  Doesn't matter if we lose all of our faceoffs for the rest of the year.  We will figure it out in the summer when the new guys come in.  Replacing BO's faceoffs is the least of our concern.  None of New Jersey's goals came off of a lost faceoff.  It wasn't as big of a deal as everyone is making it out to me.  The stat I liked is that we were aggressive all night and outhit New Jersey 33-15.  That's Rick Tocchet hockey.  One bite at a time.  We also went 3-3 on the penalty kill during regulation time, including killing a 5-3.  The forwards were much more aggressive on the PK.  Again, Rick Tocchet hockey.

 

If you actually watched the game you would have seen a big difference in all of the little things.  The score doesn't tell the whole story.  We had a brain fart for 50 seconds in the second period when all hell broke loose.  The rest of the 59 minutes of the game we looked like the better team playing a much better defensive structure.

As a tanker I really don't care much about the score other than cementing a #5 pick or better. That said I will admit that I have used the fast forward in previous games. Last night I didn't do that. As you accurately pointed out the improvement in the Canuck play was noticeable. Enough so that I was focusing on play over the 200'. Improved backcheck and improved puck support. The fewest unforced errors I have seen from Meyers all year! Foote was in fine form. Not sure if I would want to go back to the bench if I screwed up on a d-side play.