Borrowing from the dusty playbook of Ike and Tina Turner, the
Vancouver Canucks never, ever do anything easy. They can’t stand
prosperity. They don’t do boring. They can’t function without a
little melodrama. They play hockey like so many adrenaline junkies.
They have an uncomfortable knack for letting teams off the hook.
With the Canucks, a playoff series isn’t over until they’ve raised
everyone’s blood pressure into the danger zone.
VANCOUVER, B.C.
Borrowing from the dusty playbook of Ike and Tina Turner, the Vancouver Canucks never, ever do anything easy.
They can’t stand prosperity. They don’t do boring. They can’t function without a little melodrama. They play hockey like so many adrenaline junkies.
They have an uncomfortable knack for letting teams off the hook. With the Canucks, a playoff series isn’t over until they’ve raised everyone’s blood pressure into the danger zone.
And so it was in this fifth game of the Western Conference Final against San Jose. The Canucks were at their sweaty-palmed best and worst in Tuesday’s 3-2 double-overtime win that clinched a spot in the Stanley Cup Final.
Leading 3-1 in the series, they waited until the final 13 seconds of regulation, when Rogers Arena was in full panic mode, to send the game into overtime.
They waited until they could squeeze every ounce of incredible out of another Stanley Cup playoff game.
They waited until goaltender Roberto Luongo had skated to the bench, until they had that extra attacker, until they could get the puck onto the lethal stick of Henrik Sedin.
Henrik fired a shot that Ryan Kesler, standing in front of San Jose goaltender Antti Niemi, redirected into the goal to tie the game, 2-2 with 13.2 seconds left.
That goal, like the first Canucks’ goal eight minutes into the game, was hockey artistry. Sedins’ magic. One of those connect-the-dots kind of plays that Vancouver fans have become accustomed to watching from the twins.
Thirteen-point-two seconds from a Game 6 in San Jose, the Canucks found a way to get into overtime.
They are the kings of drama.
The Canucks blew a three-games-to-none lead over Chicago before winning the deciding Game 7 in overtime. They had a chance to clinch at home in the second round against Nashville, but lost the fifth game and had to win the series on the road.
And for most of this night, they played on their heels. With a chance to be killers, they played without that instinct. San Jose outshot Vancouver in regulation 36-20.
That third period started when Luongo roamed out of his net just 24 seconds into the third, forgetting that his stickhandling is ham-handed.
He tried to poke-check the puck away from Joe Pavelski, but didn’t make it. The puck slid to Devin Setoguchi, who popped the go-ahead goal into an empty net for a 2-1 lead.
For so much of the night, however, Luongo was remarkable. He stopped 50 of 52 shots through the first overtime.
And, with every shot the fans inside Rogers Arena got louder, showering Luongo_the goaltender with whom they’ve had an on-going love-hate relationship_with nothing but love.
Luuu!
For one minute and 23 seconds in the first period, when San Jose had a 5-on-3 advantage, he defended his goal as if it were his home.
He slid from side to side to stop Pavelski and twice stoned Jumbo Joe Thornton. Showing the kind of urgent desperation that teams on the brink of elimination often have, the Sharks peppered Luongo. They threw pucks at him from every angle.
They went high on him. They went low. They crowded the net. Heavy hands. Heavy sticks. Heavy pressure.
Luuuu was equal to it.
Eight minutes into the game he was given a 1-0 lead, when Daniel Sedin, his back to the play, slid a pass between his legs to twin Henrik Sedin, who quickly tapped a pass to Alex Burrows alone in front of Niemi.
The Sedins aren’t the fastest skaters, but they have an ability to create space that must make the rink feel like a football field for defensemen.
But on a night that didn’t want to end, this game belonged to Luongo. It was his to win or lose.
Life as a goaltender in hockey-mad Vancouver never is easy. Luongo, 32, lives in a glass house. Every save is expected and every goal he allows is scrutinized like the bones from an archaeological dig.
Even last year, when he was in the net for Canada as it won the Olympic gold medal, he never seemed to be good enough. He went down too quickly. He looked jittery in the biggest games.
That kind of melodrama followed him into this season.
He lost his captaincy. And he was pulled from one game and didn’t start another in the Chicago series.
But he has played some of his best in these games against San Jose, the biggest games of his Canucks career. He had 33 saves in the Game 4 win in San Jose. He made a big save on Kyle Wellwood early in the first overtime.
He played well enough for the Canucks to win in regulation. But that would be too easy and that’s not the Vancouver way.
— Column by Steve Kelley, The Seattle Times
