Today is a day off for the Vancouver Canucks and Edmonton Oilers as they prepare for Monday’s all-important Game 7 at Rogers Arena.
The Florida Panthers, New York Rangers and Dallas Stars are also having bad days, but will watch on Monday to see which Canadian team will join them in the final four.
Here are five things you should know about the NHL playoffs:
Flush it away. Focus forward. Play Game 7 like you want to be a hero.
These were the words of Vancouver Canucks coach Rick Tocchet last night after his team was trounced 5-1 by the dominant Oilers in Edmonton.
The Oilers, with regular player Stuart Skinner back in goal, held the Canucks to 15 shots on goal and broke the trend of games with only one goal difference with the first landslide victory of the series.
Tocchet said injured All-Star goalie Thatcher Demko would not return for Game 7, but hoped his team’s fighting spirit and bounce-back drive would do so.
The Oilers were quick to downplay the momentum following the Canucks’ Game 5 win in Vancouver, telling reporters they were confident they had momentum on their side heading back to the West Coast.
The winner of Monday’s game will travel to Dallas on Thursday to face the Stars in Game 1 of the Western Conference finals.
Stay tuned.
NO RUN-THROUGH PHASE FOR DRAISAITL
Leon Draisaitl continued his offensive dominance in Edmonton’s 5-1 win over Vancouver last night. The Oilers superstar added two assists and extended his point streak to 11 straight games.
Draisaitl joins Nathan MacKinnon (14 games in 2020) and Evgeny Kuznetsov (11 games in 2018) as the third active player to score points in 11 consecutive postseason appearances.
Draisaitl is also only the fourth player in NHL history to record 60 assists in 60 playoff games and the third in league history to reach the 100-point mark after Wayne Gretzky and Mario Lemieux.
TOOTH OR CONSEQUENCES
Defenseman Chris Tanev, who shone in Vancouver and Calgary before joining the Dallas Stars this season, may have a hard time putting on a big smile in the third-round team photos.
Tanev played 32:58 minutes in Friday’s series-deciding win over the Colorado Avalanche – a 2-1 decider in double overtime in Game 6. That’s not bad for a 34-year-old who is playing in his 14th NHL season and had to undergo emergency dental surgery in Game 5.
Tanev had his tooth popped in a hard hit by Nathan MacKinnon. He rushed through the tunnel to have the tooth pulled and was back on the ice to finish the game. While playing for the Canucks in 2018, he was hit in the face and lost 6 1/2 teeth.
As Stars trainer Pete DeBoer said after Tanev’s last lost chick, he doesn’t have many teeth left. DeBoer then quickly added that Tanev didn’t have many teeth anyway.
BARKOV CLOSES ANOTHER SELKE
Florida Panthers captain Aleksander Barkov was delighted with his win against the Boston Bruins, securing a spot in the Eastern Conference finals against the New York Rangers. Yesterday he received more good news: he was awarded the Selke Trophy as the best defensive forward in the NHL.
Barkov is a two-time Selke winner after also finishing first in voting for the 2021 award. He was instrumental in the Panthers allowing the fewest goals this season and won 57.3 percent of his faceoffs, ranking him ninth among players with at least 50 games and 500 attempts.
The 28-year-old center from Finland received 156 of 194 first-past-the-post votes from members of the Professional Hockey Writers Association and was listed on all but two ballots.
YEAR OF COMEBACK
Falling behind doesn’t necessarily mean elimination in this year’s playoffs. Before the Canucks and Oilers met on Saturday, 51 percent of games this postseason ended in comeback wins. New York, Florida and Dallas all reached the conference finals by coming from behind to win.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 19, 2024.
The Canadian Press
