What’s wrong with the Canucks’ Power(less)play??
OK so last time I did a “what’s wrong with the Canucks” post they started winning. I figure I’ll try that again. Seriously, wtf??? We should have won the game last night…Anaheim gave it to us on a platter several times and we just couldn’t complete. How can you have not one but TWO 5 on 3’s and not score a freaking goal? Worse, only get 3 shots total from the two of them???? It’s an embarrassment. Heck, we should have beat Dallas in 5; and would have if our powerplay had any teeth. I tell you what, it’s a good thing we have Roberto Luongo in goal or we’d have been gone in the first series.
I figure Salo is playing injured, and because of that we have no quarterback to set it up. The Sedins are trying way too hard to be pretty, and Brent Sopel is just a little too slow in the head. Ohlund is good, but he’s more of a workhorse and shot guy than a play maker. And of course Mitchell…well he may well be the best stay at home defenseman in the NHL, but he certainly doesn’t score alot of goals. So what’s the answer? What’s coach Vigneault gonna do to fix this clusterfuck?
I say change it up next power play. Mess with their heads. Put out a line with Morrison as center, Burrows and Cowan and don’t be pretty, be mean. Burrows is a great play maker, although he doesn’t score much, and with Cooke MIA, him and Cowan are the forwards with the most nastiness in them…Cowan cuz he’s tough and Burrows cuz he’s an agitator. So throw that line out with Salo and Mitchell on defense as your top PP line, or maybe even just Mitchell and put out Naslund or Pyatt as a fourth forward (Naslud cuz of his hands or Pyatt cuz of his size in front of the net). Morrison takes the faceoff then rides the point with Mitchell and quarterbacks everything, let the other guys make hits and take shots. And most importantly, STOP WAITING FOR THE PERFECT SET UP and shoot the damn puck. Anaheim has at least one defenseman with a longer reach than you think, and if u keep passing he’s going to break up the play and send us back to our zone. As we saw 8 times last night.
I don’t know, maybe my suggestion is dumb, but using the sedins with linden and naslund with morrison and smolinski isn’t working for shite right now. Coach Vigneault HAS to change things up and get this going, or there’s no way we can survive this series, let alone the whole post-season. Luongo and Mitchell can take us so far, but without production on special teams we are doomed. There is no reason we can’t beat Anaheim…sure they’re a great team, but so is Vancouver when they play on their game. We happen to have a slightly better goal tender. So why shouldn’t we win this series? The only thing left to do is get the powerplay working, and we can take the next 3.
Yes, I know…I should be a consultant! 😛
the rant trap 
They gotta stop trying to walk the puck in all the time. The Ducks are better near the line, and the Canucks are only good when they are set up. They should dump the puck in and recover all the time instead of trying to push their way past the Duck’s offensive (which usually results in the puck going all the way down the ice).
Well, I agree. The only issue is that the present power play units have been playing the cycle and cross ice set up power play strategy since the beginning of the season; to make them change now could be difficult. They can talk about it all they want, but I don’t know that the Sedins in particular are even capable of switching up their game that much at this stage of things. We need a whole new power play unit face and we need to stop being pretty and start being gritty. Of course, with Cowan probably out tonight my suggestion above doesn’t work any longer 😦 .
The ducks are just big obviously there gunna have a better defence if they have bigger more agreessive players out there.the canucks need to put more on net i love the sedins but oh my god enought of the pretty passing crap.and with naslund he has just totally lost his touch.over all though the canucks are an amazing team if they just scored more goals they could deffiently be a stanley cup team.!! beacause without a doubt luongo deffiently does him job out there.
Uh…yeah…please note that I wrote this post a year ago during the 2007 playoffs… It’s not the tepid power play right now at all…
look where ’em ‘nucks are now?
i agree with one thing, sopels a fucking retard, or was anyways. Point is, the canucks Defence really picked it up this year.