GAME DAY PREVIEW- Game Fifty Five: Canucks vs Calgary

VANCOUVER CANUCKS (22-28-4) vs CALGARY FLAMES (25-26-3)

ROGERS ARENA- VANCOUVER, BC

1:00PM PST

TV: SPORTSNET PACIFIC, SPORTSNET WEST. RADIO: SPORTSNET 650

OPPOSING BLOG: MATCHSTICKS AND GASOLINE

As surreal as this past year and (almost) a half have been, the Canucks continuing to slog through their regular season while the playoffs are on is probably one of the most bizarre things that’s ever happened to this team, but honestly it couldn’t have happened to any other team. Comical failure is in their DNA.

I mean, I enjoyed the shit out of seeing a team on their 5th game in 7 nights rally to tie that game on Sunday. But the hockey gods were never going to let them win, and a deflection off Alex Edler being the dagger in OT is proof of that.

LINEUPS

Canucks projected lineup

Nils Hoglander — J.T. Miller — Brock Boeser

Tanner Pearson — Bo Horvat — Matthew Highmore

Marc Michaelis — Tyler Graovac — Jayce Hawryluk

Jimmy Vesey — Travis Boyd — Will Lockwood

Alexander Edler — Nate Schmidt

Quinn Hughes — Tyler Myers

Jack Rathbone — Travis Hamonic

Thatcher Demko

Braden Holtby

Scratched: Kole Lind, Jalen Chatfield, Olli Juolevi, Jonah Gadjovich, Zack MacEwen

Injured: Brandon Sutter (upper body), Tyler Motte (undisclosed), Antoine Roussel (lower body), Jay Beagle (undisclosed), Elias Pettersson (upper body), Justin Bailey (shoulder), Micheal Ferland (head)

Flames projected lineup

Johnny Gaudreau — Elias Lindholm — Matthew Tkachuk

Milan Lucic — Derek Ryan — Dillon Dube

Andrew Mangiapane — Mikael Backlund — Adam Ruzicka

Josh Leivo — Dominik Simon — Brett Ritchie

Mark Giordano — Christopher Tanev

Juuso Valimaki — Rasmus Andersson

Connor Mackey — Michael Stone

Louis Domingue

Jacob Markstrom

Scratched: Glenn Gawdin, Oliver Kylington, Nikita Nesterov, Joakim Nordstrom

Injured: None

Only reasons worth watching today? Will Lockwood will make his NHL debut, and Rathbone draws back into the lineup.

GAME DAY BATTLE HYMN

From ‘King For A Day, Fool For A Lifetime’, here’s FAITH NO MORE’s ‘Digging The Grave’. We’re almost there, folks. It’s going to get better, someday.