By Karen Aney (The Cascade) – Email
Date Posted: October 3, 2011
Print Edition: September 28, 2011
On the weekend of September 17-18, the Canucks held two open practices at Rogers Arena. They were free, and general admission, which resulted in a plethora of uneducated puck bunnies – but the product on the ice was enough to make the necessary ear-plugs quite worth it.
The players included a mix of veterans and new recruits. Those on try-out contracts mixed with the new, young draft picks looking for a way to come up through the ranks. Watching the players interact with each other was fascinating: seasoned players were paired with new ones, and seeing how everyone interacted was great.
Injuries were apparent in who made appearances. Ryan Kesler, while he did not participate in practice, skated on the ice by himself beforehand. He appeared to be skating fine, but watching a player of his calibre skate slowly without anyone checking him is hardly a telling standard by which to judge his fitness. His status remains unclear: all we know is that he isn’t going to be around to start the season.
Absent entirely were Mason Raymond (another player guaranteed to miss October 1st), and Manny Malhotra. His status is week-to-week, and while no official comments have been made about his more recent procedures, logic would dictate that he’s had a very recent one that kept him off ice.
Henrik Sedin was at practice, looking amazing as usual – his hockey smarts are as strong as ever, and these perhaps over-compensated for any residual injury. He’s struggled with a hip problem since playoffs, and while it didn’t appear to hold him back while skating against his own teammates in a practice environment, it doesn’t seem like he’s going to be going head-to-head with Chara anytime soon. His left side appeared to be fine, but he refrained from leaning into his right side almost at all. It could just be the style of play he’s developed; a certain way he likes to play, but when you focus carefully on a player of his caliber for 20 minutes and he doesn’t do a signal crossover that requires pressure to be applied on his right leg, something’s probably up. Unfortunately.
So, with two centres – maybe three – not on top of their game, that put plenty of pressure on the young guys. Cody Hodgson didn’t particularly shine. Sure, he showed some fairly good skill, but the kid is fighting for a second-line position – the heart he showed didn’t match the nail-biting fans are doing over who’s going to lead what line to victory. His game play in the preseason games thus far hasn’t shown much more promise, but maybe he’s waiting for the season to start. Doesn’t seem like a great move on his part.
Niklas Jensen, our first-round draft pick, showed some pretty great skill, but still seems a little bit out of his league. He appears used to being the best on the ice, and didn’t take kindly to failure – the veterans were playing fairly rough with him, and he took just a little more time to recover from hits than necessary on NHL ice.
Darren Archibald looked good, particularly skating with Henrik. He showed some flashes of brilliance, akin to what Burrows looks like when playing with the twins. He fit. However, his skills (and experience) aren’t quite prodigious enough for the first line, and while his size (6-foot-3 and 211 pounds) qualifies him for the fourth line, he’s a cerebral player, not a gritty one. So while he fit with Henrik at practice, the question is where does he fit within the organization?
Changes continue to be made throughout the preseason. With a few key players injured, anything can happen. Hopefully, any choices made by the organization take them as far as we went last year (and maybe just that little bit further).
