GAME DAY PREVIEW- Game Forty Three: Canucks vs Ottawa

VANCOUVER CANUCKS (19-20-3) vs OTTAWA SENATORS (18-27-4)

CANADIAN TIRE CENTRE- OTTAWA, ON

2:30PM PST

TV: SPORTSNET PACIFIC, TSN5. RADIO: SPORTSNET 650

OPPOSING BLOG: SILVER SEVEN SENS

Anyone understand the start time of this game? It’s not to fit in for a doubleheader nationally, so what gives? Let’s just file that with the rest of the evidence that the NHL just absolutely lives to punish the Canucks, and move along, shall we?

To say that Monday’s loss was frustrating is putting it mildly. Seeing the offence go dry and make Marcus Hogberg look like a superstar, while wasting another damn fine performance from Braden Holtby is pretty on brand for this team. For those of you clinging to that roughly 7% chance that the Canucks can catch Montreal for that last playoff spot in the North Division, they simply cannot throw away points like that. Even if they could have tied it up, it might have been a little more tolerable. But things being what they are, this team cannot afford to lose games in regulation if they want to make it.

There were some bright spots, though. As mentioned, Holtby was great and if he can continue to play like this the rest of the way, he is gonna like real good in a Seattle Kraken jersey next season. The best part of the night from the Canucks standpoint had to be the play of Olli Juolevi. Not only did he score a goal, but he’s really developing into a solid two-way option on the back end, and for a team that will likely head into next season without Alex Edler on the blueline, Juolevi starting to show the promise the Canucks had hoped for when they drafted him is a definite bonus.

LINEUPS

Courtesy of nhl.com , this is what we will probably see this afternoon:

Canucks projected lineup

Tanner Pearson — Bo Horvat — Brock Boeser

Nils Hoglander — J.T. Miller — Zack MacEwen

Tyler Motte — Brandon Sutter — Jayce Hawryluk

Matthew Highmore — Travis Boyd — Jake Virtanen

Quinn Hughes — Travis Hamonic

Alexander Edler — Nate Schmidt

Olli Juolevi — Tyler Myers

Braden Holtby

Arturs Silovs

Scratched: Jalen Chatfield, Madison Bowey, Jimmy Vesey, Marc Michaelis

Injured: Antoine Roussel (lower body), Elias Pettersson (upper body), Jay Beagle (undisclosed), Justin Bailey (shoulder), Micheal Ferland (head), Thatcher Demko (lower body)

Senators projected lineup

Brady Tkachuk — Josh Norris — Drake Batherson

Tim Stutzle — Colin White — Evgenii Dadonov

Alex Formenton — Shane Pinto — Connor Brown

Nick Paul — Chris Tierney — Ryan Dzingel

Thomas Chabot — Nikita Zaitsev

Erik Brannstrom — Artem Zub

Victor Mete — Josh Brown

Marcus Hogberg

Filip Gustavsson

Scratched: Artem Anisimov, Jacob Bernard-Docker, Michael Amadio

Injured: Austin Watson (hand), Matt Murray (lower body), Anton Forsberg (lower body)

It doesn’t appear that there will be any changes for either team. That’s probably better for the Sens than the Canucks given the way they’ve played the last 3 games. And it should be noted that a regulation win by Ottawa would see them leapfrog the Canucks into 6th place in the division. Hashtag Thank You Jim, amirite?

Also, play Kole Lind, you absolute cowards!

GAME DAY CHATTER

GAME DAY BATTLE HYMN

A little indirect CANCON today as we give you ALLEGAEON’s awesome cover of the RUSH classic ‘Subdivisions’.

Enjoy the game, if you’re off work by then. We’re back tomorrow as they take on the Leafs. Go Canucks Go!