Fan In Van

Surprising Canucks

With the Vancouver Canucks drawing the praise of fans everywhere after defeating the St. Louis Blues in their home arena last night, a lot of the credit for the team’s success has been credited to their usual suspects: The Sedins, Roberto Luongo and Ryan Kesler have all gained a lot of attention, but there are a handful of players on the Canuck roster who should be mentioned for doing the little things that matter.

Ryan Johnson: Boy, where to begin? Johnson blocks shots, takes crucial faceoffs when clinging to one-goal leads, and he throws his weight around on a fourth line which has been responsible for a lot of the tallies in the hits category. Having Ryan Johnson’s presence on the penalty kill has also been a primary reason the Canucks have kept the Blues off the scoresheet 15 of 16 times, including three 5-on-3 situations.

Mason Raymond: Mason Raymond, throwing a body check? Mason Raymond, digging and plugging in corners? Mason Raymond getting in scrums after the whistle? Is this the same whipping boy we saw in the regular season? The speedster has shown a little more tenacity and has even looked deadly when carrying the puck on the 3rd line with Kyle Wellwood and Steve Bernier; Raymond has also seen time on the penalty kill.

Shane O’Brien: Another player who drew the ire of fans during the regular season, O’Brien has managed to play a much smarter defensive game then before. He finishes checks, makes some good defensive plays and has looked much like a lesser Ed Jovanovski out there. If O’Brien can find the net from the point, it’d be a huge plus.

Steve Bernier: Say what you want about Bernier, but the fact is he has a game-winning goal (It should really be two, considering he was supposed to be credited with the winner in Game One) and he has looked immovable on the powerplay when in front of the net. Not only that, Bernier is the team leader in hits, which says something about his desire to win. Bernier has been the kind of player you’d want to go to war with in the postseason.

But while it’s easy for the Canucks to sit back on their three wins thus far, the fourth win, the knockout blow, is always the toughest to get. The Blues, facing elimination, will be desperate. Seeing as how they fought tooth and nail to get into the playoffs, the Blues don’t want to feel as though all their hard work during the second half of the regular season amounted to a one-week extension of games before hitting the golf course.