On the night before the trade deadline, the need for something to bring life back into the Minnesota Wild was never more apparent. Too bad they were in Vancouver, where the dreams of a successful season go to die, courtesty of Alexandre Burrows and the Vancouver Canucks.
The Canucks turned moments of Wild inattention late in the second period into two goals in 28 seconds' time as the Canucks defeated the Wild 4-2 at GM Place, putting the Wild in 11th place in the NHL's Western Conference. Burrows' two goals, including the only goal of the third period, led the Canucks to within six points of first-place Calgary in the Northwest Division.
The Wild now have lost 4 in a row, including all three Western Canadian games on their odyssey-esque six-game, 10-day Western road trip, which will continue against the San Jose Sharks on Thursday at HP Pavilion San Jose. They have also managed to go 2-7 since defeating Colorado at home on Feb. 11th.
It was so bad, that the Wild only managed to get four shots on goal against Roberto Luongo in the second period, when the Wild were bottled up in their own zone for minutes at a time, unable to change lines being that the benches were too far away from where the play was taking place.
Chicken Little: They can't even get a full game out of their current line-up. This road trip is killing them...fast.
Pollyanna: Backstrom is still signed for four years!
Bottom Line: You could see this coming. The Canucks came in to the game 10-2-0 in their last 12 games at home, and they clearly are on a roll right now. The Wild came in shorthanded, battered and fried by the two games in Alberta over the weekend. Clearly, something needs to be done.
Stud: Backstrom. This game would have been 8 or 9-0 if not for him.
Dud: I'm really tempted to say everyone again, but the unbelievably bad play of Kim Johnsson convinced me to point out his Dud-ism again. (And, why do we keep him? Hmmm...could it be money? Yeah, I think so.)
Next: at San Jose, Thursday, March 5, 9:30 PM Central (7:30 PM Pacific) Time, HP Pavilion. (TV: FSNorth (includes FSWisconsin), Comcast SportsNet-Bay Area (in HD), NHL Network-Canada; XM Ch. 206)
WRT (a really tired, frustrated one at that)
No comments:
Post a Comment