The Vancouver Canucks’ road trip continues with a Saturday night stop in Toronto to face the Maple Leafs on Hockey Night in Canada.
Saturday night’s game begins a three-game run through the three Eastern Canadian teams. The Canucks will play the Leafs on Saturday, then head to Montreal on Monday and finish up with Ottawa on Tuesday.
They will finish the season-long, six-game road trip with a matchup against the Blue Jackets in Columbus on Thursday.
Quick Hits on the Competition
- The Leafs picked up a 2-1 overtime victory on Thursday night over the Philadelphia Flyers.
- 20-year-old forward Easton Cowan scored the game-winning goal on Thursday and now has goals in back-to-back games.
- William Nylander leads the Leafs with 41 points this season but has missed their last six games due to a lower-body injury. Leafs Head Coach Craig Berube says that Nylander’s return to the lineup on Saturday is a possibility.
- During Nylander’s absence, Auston Matthews has found his scoring touch, picking up six goals in those six games.
- Joseph Woll has made the most starts for the Leafs this season, and posts a 9-4-2 record with a .913% save percentage, a 2.69 goals-against average, and has one shutout.
- The Leafs are one of three teams to have over 100 goals scored at five-on-five this season. They are also one of five teams to have given up over 100 goals at five-on-five. Expect to see a lot of action at even strength on Saturday evening.
- Home ice has been good to the Leafs this season; they have the third-best home record in the league at 15-5-5.
The Story: Working Out of a Rut
Tyler Myers knows that losing is frustrating, but he also knows it is about putting in the work to address the team’s issues and improve their game to reach the next level.
“I thought we had some good moments, especially in the first [period], but our details just aren’t good enough. We’re giving up odd-man [rush] after odd-man rush, and it seems to be consistent in the last stretch here,” said Myers following Thursday’s game in Detroit.
“It comes down to the guys here in the room. We’ve got to be much better with our details, because it just accumulates and trickles down the lineup in our team game, and we have to be much better. If we didn’t have the two goalies that we have, the score would be way worse.”
One of the positive notes from Thursday’s game was Jake DeBrusk scoring his 11th power play goal of the season. DeBrusk is now tied with Leon Draisaitl for second in the league on power play markers.
DeBrusk has five points and 28 scoring chances in his five games since he was a healthy scratch.
The Canucks’ power play is 13th in the league with their 20.8% conversion rate.
Canucks’ Top Performers over the Last Five Games
Jake DeBrusk: 3g-2a-5p
Filip Hronek: 1g-3a-4p
Brock Boeser: 0g-4a-4p
Elias Pettersson: 2g-1a-3p
Kiefer Sherwood: 1g-2a-3p
Linus Karlsson: 1g-2a-3p
When and Where to Watch
Saturday’s game is at 4:00 p.m. PT, and you can watch the game on Hockey Night in Canada or listen to Brendan Batchelor’s radio call on Sportsnet 650 and the Sportsnet Radio Network.
