Driving the net
Canucks could learn from traffic in Cloutier's crease
VANCOUVER ? If the Vancouver Canucks aren't going to take exception to the incessant crease crashing being endured by starting goaltender Dan Cloutier, they might want to at least take a few notes on the results it is producing.
The NHL may have a new, obstruction-reduced look, but it is still the players who go to the net with old-school resolve that are being rewarded with goals ? and it is no coincidence the Canucks don't have a lot of names on that list right now.
"That's the way you're going to get goals in this league right now," said Cloutier, who has already seen more crashing this year than a September sorority party. "We need to take that example and do it ourselves and crash the net and get some ugly goals."
At this point the Canucks would settle for any goals, but they're not likely to come so long as the forwards continue to treat five-on-five like a power play. Too often they try to tic-tac-toe into the perfect scoring chance, usually settling for outside shots with little or no traffic in front of the net. They're stopping in the slot off the rush, looking for pretty passes and one-timers instead of driving the net looking for rebounds and garbage goals.
"There's not enough of that taking the puck and just bulldozing it to the net. Dirty goals are sticking your nose in there and getting your nose dirty," said Trent Klatt, whose own stitch and scar-bearing beak may be the best indication he's still doing that regularly. "It would make us a lot harder to play against if we did that more."
To accomplish that the Canucks focused on attacking the net throughout practice on Wednesday, sending one player wide with the puck while the other bee-lined to the crease.
"I'd love to drive to the net more if I had the opportunity to go wide with the puck in the neutral zone," winger Todd Bertuzzi said. "It hasn't been there and I think that what is missing a lot in our neutral zone is puck possession. I don't think we do enough on the wide side to be able to create chances off the rush." "If we're not too cute and we just simplify our game I think seriously it's going to help," Klatt said. "Here comes the dumb old boring line but if we get the puck in, we cycle, we hit people, we turn pucks over, we get shots, traffic ? that's where it's all going to come from, that's where this team is good. There's not enough of that right now."
Why there isn't enough of that style of play remains a mystery to Klatt, who wondered if some of the extra space created by the new rules made it too "tempting" to be cute. Klatt was careful not to cast too much doubt on the work ethic of his teammates, but captain Markus Naslund was a little less hesitant about the intensity issue.
"It comes with desire," said Naslund. "Some players don't play that game but when things don't go well you?ve got to get in there and try to grind it out."
Missing Cassels with the extra man
With a power play that has just two goals in the last 38 chances, including a 0-for during a lengthy 5-on-3 and overtime 4-on-3 against Buffalo, it was only a matter of time before the name of departed free agent playmaker Andrew Cassels came up.
Canucks coach Marc Crawford was quick to dismiss it with one of his better non-quotes of the early season ? "We don't miss him at all, he's not here" ? but the rest of the players were a little more poignant, and pointed, when the subject was raised.
"There's no doubt he was a big key to our power play last year," said Naslund. "He was a guy that always settled the puck down and he took those couple of steps and was always turned the right way so he could either fire it across the crease or fake and go back. He's a very good power play forward, there's no doubt about that."
Without Cassels, the Canucks have struggled to establish that same presence at the side of the net. That has left their approach all too predictable, running almost exclusively through Naslund at the half- boards. His passes down low no longer result in the tap-ins Cassels produced so often by walking out from behind the net.
"Whoever the person was walking out, it was usually an easy play for some reason," said Bertuzzi, not wanting to use Cassels name while describing that same play that resulted in so many of his career-best 36 goals. "We're not finding it, we're not getting it."
Bertuzzi is also struggling to adjust to defenders who have given up trying to move him from the front of the net and instead play in front of him. That's allowing them to block shots and take away passes before they find the big man in his office on top of the crease.
One potential solution involves the Vancouver defencemen moving more to get the point shots through, something Ed Jovanovski did well to score Tuesday against Buffalo. The other is for that down low forward to walk out and find Bertuzzi on the backside after he pushes away from the coverage, something that isn't happening often enough lately.
"With Jan (Hlavac) or Brendan (Morrison) or whoever plays down there, I think they still have skill but they've just got to take those couple of steps and make it a threat," said Naslund. "If they drag the D down and stay close on them it will open so much more."
Trick or treat?
It was a day early and probably meant more as a fashion statement then a Halloween gag, but Naslund couldn't resist poking his head into Bertuzzi?s media scrum to ask what was up with the long, light-brown leather coat his linemate was wearing after practice.
"It's my Reggie Dunlop look," shot back Bertuzzi, a classic reference to the old-time coach of that classic hockey movie Slap Shot. "I'm trying to look like a coach."
It was entertaining, but the best costume story went to Klatt, who recalled the time former teammate Adrian Aucoin showed up at the team?s Halloween party dressed as none other than Klatt himself ? and his inseparable linemates, the Sedin twins.
"He had the jersey on, the whole thing, and there was a head on either shoulder with bright orange hair on top, and on the back it said Triplet," laughed Klatt at the reference to his nickname during his first year with the twins. "It was the funniest costume I?ve seen."
Off to Europe
Undersized winger Steve Kariya is one of six players loaned to Canada's National Men's Team by six NHL teams for the 2002 Deutschland Cup. Kariya, who has three goals and five assists through nine games with the AHL Manitoba Moose, will join the team during the second week of November and will miss the two games.
Other NHL prospects on the team include Micki Dupont (Calgary), Michael Henrich (Edmonton), Travis Roche (Minnesota), Peter Sarno (Edmonton) and Jonathan Sim (Dallas), making it one of the smaller teams to wear Canadian colours.
The move to add minor leaguers to Team Canada for these types of competitions was sparked by Vancouver Canucks Vice-President of Player Personnel and new National Men's Team General Manager Steve Tambellini.
Icechips
Crawford wasn't talking to the media about potential line changes for Thursday?s game against Colorado (7:00 p.m. on Sportsnet and CKNW AM 980), but he indicated any tinkering would be "subtle." That likely means Todd Warriner getting back in for beleaguered winger Jarkko Ruutu and more mobile rearguard Nolan Baumgartner replacing Bryan Allen against the speedy Avalanche...Bet on overtime against the 3-1-3-2 Avalanche, who have already played six extra period games this year, just two more than the Canucks...Crawford said he continues to mention the crease crashing to officials who should be protecting the goalies now that defencemen are no longer allowed to hold up driving forwards that don?t have the puck.
Cheers,
Aquaman