Back end showing wear and tear
HANGING ON: Netminders will be under more pressure in playoffs unless number of shots against cut down
It was a very happy day for the Vancouver Canucks Wednesday, having made the playoffs while perched on their couches the previous evening, the team goal having been realized after a successful regular season.
They still have to battle for homeice advantage in the first round but whether that’s a real advantage to anyone but the owner is open for discussion when you consider how this team has been better away from home much of the season.
However, they’ve been much better at home lately and it’s well that Thursday’s game against Arizona here means something because their defence needs much work.
We speak here of the barrage of shots on goal this team has been giving up lately. Part of it comes from the last road trip where they were playing quality teams away from home, but over the last seven games their shots-against average is right around 36 per game, way up over the sub-30 season average.
It reached its peak in the game in Winnipeg when virtually every rush turned into a scoring chance. And even though they held L.A. to one goal, there were 37 shots which needed to be stopped and there will be no easy teams in the playoffs.
Part of the reason the Canucks have been able to endure is because of Eddie Lack’s outstanding netminding, which led the goalie to say about his upcoming six-day break after the Arizona game: “I’ve played a lot of hockey lately.”
It also points to an area of concern as this team goes forward.
The back end, once the great strength of this team, is showing a lot of wear and tear, and specifically we mean Dan Hamhuis and Kevin Bieksa, both of whom have groin and/or abdominal problems they won’t discuss.
They have done a wonderful job pushing through the pain to stay on the ice, but when the season ends it’s unlikely any surgery or rehab program is going to bring these guys back to their prime. They’ve been great, but health and age is catching up despite their heroic efforts to rage against these factors.
Chris Tanev and Alex Edler are still in their prime and the leaders of what is still a fairly solid back end, but neither one is a classic No. 1.
As a duo they are either well back when it comes to a No. 1 pairing or the best No. 2 pairing around, depending on how cynically you want to look at them. The problem emerging is that unless this team unearths somebody soon or spends what cap room they’ll have in the summer on a quality D, this unit is almost certainly going to slide.
How quickly will depend upon how Bieksa and Hamhuis, who both still have time on contracts that have no-trade clauses, are able to repair themselves in the offseason. Star physio Rick Celebrini will be a huge asset in this area, but he hasn’t yet had any miracles credited to his work.
But on this day in which they reupped Luca Sbisa back there for reasons known only to themselves, it was a worry for a later day, as these guys weren’t even concerned about the shots against.
“Yes there’s been lots of shots, but you have to look at the chances more than shots,” said Yannick Weber, who has been a bright light defensively, contributing from the No. 6 spot and lifting the power play lately with his right-handed cannon.
“I think we’ve been getting more chances than the opposition in most games and some of the shots we’ve been giving up have been from the outside. Eddie will handle 50 of those any day.”
“You always want to limit the number of shots as much as you can but we’ve been playing good teams in their rinks and I think we’re getting better chances which is why we’ve been winning games,” said Edler, who has enjoyed a great bounceback season turning his minus-39 rating of last year into a plus-10.
The rosy view is understandable given the circumstances of the day, but this team is like many before it in this uniform, heavily dependent on outstanding goaltending.
In today’s game you can often say that about any team, but if the request is going to be to stop 35 shots in every playoff tilt, it puts a ton of pressure on Lack or Ryan Miller to pull that off every night.