CHICAGO -- Despite losing forward Pavol Demitra and defenseman Sami Salo, the Vancouver Canucks stuck together and trotted out one of their most complete and dominating performances of the postseason in Game 3 Tuesday night.
 
Salo has spent the past 24 hours skating in two time zones and aims for a return to the ice for Thursday's Game 4, but even in his absence, Vancouver's shorthanded defense came up big, muscling its stronger and more athletic opponents and immediately seizing control of the game's tenor.
 
There was a sense in the Vancouver dressing room that Chicago downshifted from the physical play and the traffic jamming at the net that proved so successful in Game 2. The turning point came almost immediately in Game 3, when burly winger Dustin Byfuglien was whistled for goalkeeper interference at 2:45 of the first.
 
Even Hawks forward Ben Eager shied away from a fight when winger Darcy Hordichuk was willing to drop gloves in the second.
 
"We're not sure why, but Chicago isn't looking to fight," Hordichuk said after Wednesday's practice. "We are trying to take a physical game right to them, and they don't want any part of it."
 
Throughout Chicago's quarterfinal win against the Flames, Blackhawks bruisers like Byfuglien, Eager, and Adam Burish played prickly burrs in Calgary's saddle. It's said that physical play rarely takes a day off, and the Blackhawks amassed 35 hits in the game, but Chicago's lack of a stiff back at key junctures of Game 3 was every bit as surprising as any number of its missed passes and whiffed wristers.
 
"We're past challenging these guys physically," Canucks center Ryan Kesler said. "We've got the lead now, and guys like Eager or Burish, or Buff aren't on our radar. We're going to play our style of hockey and go for another [win Thursday]."
 
While the Blackhawks' dressing room is still sounding a unified, defiant chord with regard to Vancouver's manhandling, Game 3 provided all the proof necessary. A shorthanded Canucks D blocked 21 shots and won the spacing battle in the slot. Of the shots the Hawks did get off -- 24 in the game -- very few were true scoring opportunities, and the Canucks simply ground down Chicago's imposing net rush to pebbles.
 
Individual efforts are too numerous to mention, but defender Kevin Bieksa perfectly inhabited the extra play Salo's absence accorded him, logging a game-high 27:54 of ice time. The fourth-year man also crossed up Eager and garnered an early assist on Mason Raymond's goal in the first. And after a modest 10 blocks in his first six playoff games, defenseman Mattias Ohlund blocked five shots and was the only Canuck to finish at plus-2 on the game.
 
Even netminder Roberto Luongo got into the act. After an admittedly subpar Game 2, after which he called out himself and his teammates as capable of playing better, Luongo walled off the net in Game 3. What's more, he popped Byfuglien after the forward got mouthy (saying afterward, "I don't have to take it from that guy") in the second, after Brian Campbell's goal.

-- Brett Ballantini