NorthWest Sports Blog brings you daily features on Oregon, Washington State, and BC amateur and pro sports teams.
NWSB Insider and Vancouver Canucks’ blogger Richard Hodges is back to give you his love ‘em and hate ‘em from Vancouver’s win over the Predators. Richard points out we’ve missed you Ryan Kesler. The pivot’s return has revitalized the team and the powerplay as the Canucks are really starting to look like the 2011 version. Need a negative? After a great start to the season, the inconsistency has been slipping back into Kevin Bieksa’s game.
Richard Hodges previews the Vancouver Canucks vs. Nashville Predators April 15th matchup. Richard says the Canucks will try to push forward after the gut punch loss to the Avs on Saturday, and will do so with Roberto Luongo between the pipes, leaving their starter for the much better St Louis Blues tomorrow night. Richard asks if the Ryan Kesler on wing experimental is successful, is a Jordan Schroeder call-up far behind?
NWSB Insider and Vancouver Canucks’ blogger Richard Hodges give you his love ‘em and hate ‘em from Vancouver’s win over the Nashville Predators Thursday night. Richard points out it really is the year of the honey badger for the Vancouver Canucks, as Jannik Hansen has enjoyed a tenacious breakout year. What will Coach Alain Vigneault do with Andrew Ebbett moving forward?
Richard Hodges previews the Nashville Predators vs. Vancouver Canucks March 14th matchup. Richard says the Canucks are back in town, which means the traditional first game home trap is in play tonight. The Preds will miss Paul Gaustad, Colin Wilson and Patric Hornqvist while the Canucks are essentially healthy with Kevin Bieksa if you try not to think about Ryan Kesler. Thankfully, Bieksa will be back tonight.
NWSB Insider and Vancouver Canucks blogger Mitch Dyck brings us up to speed on the storylines he’s watching for and delivers his winning gameday tips for the Predators vs. Canucks game Thursday night. These two teams are known for putting teams to sleep and winning games by one goal. According to Jeff Patterson, it looks as if Kevin Bieksa will be back in the lineup tonight, making either Andrew Alberts or Cam Barker a healthy scratch.
NWSB Rookie Insider and Vancouver Canucks blogger Mitch Dyck puts pen to paper today with some more thoughts on the Canucks non-roster sheet for Weber, As well as an in depth look at the top six Canucks defenseman currently on the Vancouver roster. Dan Hamhuis, Alex Edler, Kevin Bieksa, Keith Ballard, Chris Tanev, and Jason Garrison. Kevin Connauton has made strides in the minors.
NWSB Rookie Insider and Vancouver Canucks blogger Mitch Dyck puts pen to paper today with some thoughts on the Canucks not putting an offer sheet or a trade offer in on Shea Weber. He asks was GM Mike Gillis a sleep at the wheel or was he that confident that Weber would play just one year in Nashville and become an unrestricted free agent after? Or if Vancouver was involved, was the price to high?
NWSB Insider and Vancouver Canucks blogger Reggie Gill weighs in with his ananlysis of the current situation brewing in the NHL 2012 Free Agency headlines. Mainly the news surrounding the Minnesota Wild grabbing Ryan Suter and Zach Parise this week in a HUGE Transaction for them. The NHL’s northwest division just got tougher. Do the Canucks plan to go after Dan Hamhuis’ former teammate Shea Weber from Nashville now?
Dave B. does another Northwest Athlete profile on one of the most prolific NHL’ers to ever come from these parts, Paul Kariya. Kariya played the majority of his career with the Anaheim Ducks where he once held all the franchise points records, but his career was cut short due to numerous injuries, namely concussions.
NWSB Vancouver Canucks Insider Richard Hodges tells us the Canucks may have the division and the number two seed locked up but St Louis could be a very very frightening team to face in the West finals, 7-2-1 in their last 10, and would you not want to at least take a shot at wrestling home ice advantage?
NWSB Insider Dave B brings us another profile featuring Vancouver born Mike Santorelli. Santorelli, currently of the Florida Panthers, started off in the Vancouver Minor Hockey system and is now making his mark in the National Hockey League.
NWSB Insider and Vancouver Canucks blogger Richard Hodges takes the opportunity to introduce Canucks fans to Marc-Andre Gragnani. The defenseman acquired in the Cody Hodgson deal with Buffalo. His defensive game is rather limited but at 24, Gragnani only has 61 NHL regular season games under his belt, 46 of them this year where he has a respectable 16 points.
