Game 45: Winnipeg Jets vs Vancouver Canucks pre-game report

The new look Jets appear to be sticking with what worked for them in a 3-0 win over the Avs on Saturday which is Nikolaj Ehlers and Alex Iafallo on a line with Adam Lowry. With Vlad Namestnikov not available as he recovers from a blocked shot suffered on Friday it looks like Moose captain Dominic Toninato will get his second straight game. The AHL club of Manitoba is in town the team and we might see the team recall a forward as they don’t have an extra right now. While the blueline inches toward getting healthier it looked at practice like Dylan Coghlan would be the odd man out with Ville Heinola returning to his offside to play alongside Logan Stanley.

Now I won’t pretend to have a clue as to what is going on with the Canucks as that is not our focus but it sure seems like there has been plenty of noise surrounding the NHL club on Canada’s west coast. On the ice they had been mired in a mini slump losing four straight games (although two of those four were in OT) before defeating the Leafs in Toronto on Saturday night. They have an interesting home vs road disparity in that they have a losing record in Vancouver of 7-8-6 while outside of BC they are 12-5-4. All those loser points add up as they sit just outside the final wild card spot in the Western Conference.

When it comes to special teams the visitors sit with the 14th ranked PP and the 12th ranked PK while the home team remains the top power play in the entire NHL and their penalty kill continues to improve now sitting in 16th.

Skate news:

No changes today. Colin Miller skating in a yellow, non-contact jersey.

Jets projected lines & D pairs:

Connor-Scheifele-Vilardi
Ehlers-Lowry-Iafallo
Niederreiter-Kupari-Perfetti
Toninato-Gustafsson-Barron

Morrissey-DeMelo
Samberg-Pionk
Stanley-Heinola

Hellebuyck
Comrie

Canucks projected lines & D pairs:

DeBrusk – Pettersson – Boeser
Höglander – Miller – Garland
Heinen – Suter – Sherwood
PDG – Blueger – Lekkerimäki

Hughes – Hronek
Forbort – Soucy
Juulsen – Myers

Via Brendan Batchelor, Play-by-Play Voice of the Canucks on Sportsnet 650 from before their last game.

Player media:

Coach media:

Topics:

1) Trying to stay at an elite level and why it’s so hard.
2) How can you tell you’re getting your opponents best? (1:01)
3) Josh Morrissey vs Quinn Hughes match-up (1:32)
4) What can additional PP touches do for Ville Heinola? (2:42)
5) How can PP work translate to 5 on 5 confidence? (3:21)
6) Other teams not taking penalties against Jets (4:03)
7) What can they do to draw more power plays? (5:03)

Special edition of Illegal Curve Hockey live at cityplace:

Up Next:

Puck drop is at 7 PM CST. Be sure to head over to illegalcurve.com following the game for a recap of the action. You can join us on our YouTube channel for the Illegal Curve Post-Game Show around 9:40 PM CST as we discuss and analyze the results of the game.

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