GAME DAY PREVIEW- GAME FIFTY-SEVEN: Canucks vs Montreal

VANCOUVER CANUCKS (28-23-6) vs TORONTO MAPLE LEAFS (15-34-7)

ROGERS ARENA, VANCOUVER, BC

7:30PM PST

TV: SPORTSNET PACIFIC, TSN2, TNT. RADIO: SPORTSNET 650

OPPOSING BLOG: HABS EYES ON THE PRIZE

The Canucks are back from what was easily their most successful road trip of the season, winning three of four, including impressive victories over the New York Rangers and Toronto Maple Leafs, sweeping the season series between those teams in both instances. They now have the next seven at home, and the song remains the same for the fate of their season.

The Canucks have gone 19-8-4 since the termination of Travis Green and Jim Benning, and they have to continue at this pace just to be able to erase their dismal first two months of the season, let alone make the playoffs. It’s an interesting mix of teams coming through, with a handful of teams that they lost to earlier this year that all sit beneath them in the standings, three playoff teams, and tonight’s opponent, the Montreal Canadiens.

The Habs have had a similar arc to their season story line, though far more pronounced in the highs and lows (especially the lows). They also staggered the firing of their front office and coaching, but the response to the coaching change has been very similar. Winners of seven of their last ten, Montreal’s pulled off some big upsets since Martin St Louis grabbed the coaching reigns, but much like we saw after that initial tear the Canucks went on with Bruce Boudreau, the Habs are due for a relapse, and their poor record combined with continued injury struggles could play right into the Canucks hands tonight.

LINEUPS

Courtesy of nhl.com, tonight’s disasterpiece should somewhat resemble this. Maybe.

Canadiens projected lineup

Cole Caufield — Nick Suzuki — Josh Anderson

Mike Hoffman — Laurent Dauphin — Brendan Gallagher

Paul Byron - Jake Evans — Rem Pitlick

Joel Armia — Ryan Poehling — Artturi Lehkonen

Brett Kulak — Jeff Petry

Alexander Romanov — Ben Chiarot

Kale Clague — Chris Wideman

Sam Montembeault

Cayden Primeau

Scratched: Cedric Paquette, Corey Schueneman, Michael Pezzetta, Mathieu Perreault

Injured: Jake Allen (lower body), Christian Dvorak (upper body), David Savard (ankle), Jonathan Drouin (wrist), Joel Edmundson (back), Carey Price (knee), Andrew Hammond (lower body)

Canucks projected lineup

Tanner Pearson — J.T. Miller — Conor Garland

Vasily Podkolzin — Bo Horvat — Brock Boeser

Nils Hoglander — Elias Pettersson — Alex Chiasson

Tyler Motte — Juho Lammikko — Matthew Highmore

Oliver Ekman-Larsson — Tyler Myers

Quinn Hughes — Luke Schenn

Brad Hunt — Travis Hamonic

Thatcher Demko

Jaroslav Halak

Scratched: Madison Bowey, Sheldon Rempal

Injured: Jason Dickinson (lower body), Kyle Burroughs (upper body), Tucker Poolman (headaches)

Yeeesh, that Montreal injury list is something, eh? As for the Canucks, no changes from the past couple games, it would seem. Sheldon Rempal was called up earlier this week, but barring something catastrophic, he’s unlikely to get into the lineup.

GAME DAY CHATTER

GAME DAY BATTLE HYMN

Stumbled across this awesome cover of an underrated PRONG song from the ‘Prove You Wrong’ album by Texas thrash kings POWER TRIP. Love that they covered this, especially with the BAD BRAINS vibe of the original ringing true here. Metal lost a true gem in Riley Gale.

Enjoy the game, folks. Go Canucks Go! Slava Ukraini!