CANUCKS		FLAMES
	AT

*UPDATE (12:41): It's Mike Gillis' birthday today. He's 52, and looks like he has not had a night of sleep since he was 10. JK

*Update (11:41 AM): Some friendly banter between Brendan Morrison and Roberto Luongo.

*UPDATE (11:36 AM): Same lineup for the Canucks tonight except...Kevin Bieksa will play and my buddy Aaron Rome will sit. -Canucks Twitter feed.

Heading into their tilt with the Flames, Vancouver has scored nearly 40 per cent of its goals on the road with the man advantage (Dhiren Mahiban from the Globe and Mail.) That's still the lingering issue isn't it? The Canucks have not played well 5 on 5 on the road. In general, however, they do seem to be improving away from Rogers Arena. In October they had a 1-3-1 road record. In November, a 4-2-1 record. The boys have been clicking lately and hopefully this long layoff has not had any negative effect on that.

It's Roberto Luongo vs Miikka Kiprusoff.

The Flames returned home on Monday and beat the Wild 3-0. Last week they played 5 games in 7 nights on the road! Yikes! They got pounded semi-hard on that swing, going 1-2-2. 4 of a possible 10 points and now are on the brink of falling into obscurity, 5 points out of a playoff spot. They went 4-7-2 in November. On November 17, prior to that road trip from hell, they had lost 7 of their previous 8 games dating back to October 28. They traded troubled sibling Brett Sutter and Ian White to the Carolina Hurricanes in exchange

for Anton Babchuk and Tom Kostopoulos. Babchuk is listed as an offensive defenceman but has no points for the Flames yet. Nor does Kostopoulos, who is a checking winger.

Since this is the first meeting of the season between these 2 bitter rivals, a lot of talk will be about Brendan Morrison, who the Canucks let go after preseason in favor of Peter Schaefer. Morrison was sickened management let him go and wanted some form of explanation. I'm not sure he ever got one. Now he can become a Canuck killer to show Gillis that he made a mistake. I expect a big game from B-Mo. Same with Jarome Iginla, who has 8 goals and 4 assists in his last 9 games. Olli Jokinen averages 17:50 a game, and has had 55 shots in his 21 games...but only 2 goals and 9 assists to show for it. Fail. Alex Tanguay is having a bounce-back season, leading the team in scoring (21 points in 24 games) and has 1 goal and 8 assists in his last 7 games. He only scored 37 points in 80 games with the Lightning last season, absolutely screwing me in one of my pools. Damn you Alex!

Should be an excellent game! These 2 teams play eachother hard.

VIDEO:

The last time the Flames and Canucks played a regular season game, the Play of the Year occurred:

Brendan Morrison forces a Game 7 after scoring in triple OT:

I don't think Kesler and Iginla like each other all that much:

Blast From The Past: Jarkko Ruutu makes Dion Phaneuf look stupid:

Double Brawl '09: