A very entertaining hockey game, albeit with a lot of special teams play

Tonight's 3-2 game was certainly very entertaining and memorable despite the terrible officiating with young referees, and this benchmark / measuring stick showed that Vancouver knows how to play Ottawa's fast game... they're capable of playing like this more often, if they can put themselves to it. I mean, they scored just 67 seconds into the game! There were a lot of (borderline / phantom) penalties in the game (Vancouver alone had 13 power plays to Ottawa's 7), so not a lot of 5-on-5 action... Mike Fisher of the Ottawa Senators was in the penalty box four times tonight, heh. But Dominik Hasek is a very good goaltender.. Stanley Cup rings and Vezina trophies prove it!

The Senators had a fluky pinball-like goal where the puck ricocheted in off two Canuck players... Alex Auld couldn't do anything about it. That led to the first overtime / shootout game at GM Place this year, where the Canucks had a power play for the first 67 seconds. They hadn't been in a shootout since the second game of the season against Edmonton, and the Dominator's considered the best in penalty shots in the game. (he hadn't been scored on this year in a shootout before tonight) Auld hadn't been in a NHL shootout before tonight, either. The shots on goal were 38-23 in favor of the Canucks.

The shooters were Heatley, Alfredsson (who scored), and Spezza for Ottawa... and Naslund, Bertuzzi (who scored even if Hasek got a big piece of the puck), and Kesler (who's been the best one-on-one in practice) for us in the first round. You can't shoot again until you go through the entire roster, so Mike Fisher shot next in the second round: Alex Auld had a great glove save! Daniel Sedin had the winner for us, and we're first in the Northwest Division again! (two points in the standings and a game in hand against Calgary are very important!)

This would have been a very exciting game to attend! Why can't we play against them eight times a season instead of Colorado? This was the one and only meeting of the two teams, and the atmosphere was playoff-like! It was the 100th straight sellout, and provided good entertainment value! One thing with these types of games: it's not a loss for Ottawa since they get one point still. It's kinda weird, but this is the new NHL...

The three stars had to have been VERY hard to pick in this game: the goalies, Peter Schaefer (ex-Canuck), Brendan Morrison (his 500th career game), Salo, Ruutu, Bertuzzi (pre-INCIDENT play), and more players besides! But the actual three stars picked were very befuddling, even though it's easy to be an armchair analyst: Morrison, Andrej Meszaros, and Jovanovski? No slight against them, but it boggles the mind. Next game: Tuesday at 4 against the New York Rangers.


Cause of Eddie Guerrero's death.

The Chicago Bulls also retired Pippen's number tonight... yay!