Let’s hear from the coach and players before diving into some interesting stats and tidbits from the series.
From the Coach
Head Coach Rick Tocchet talked about an extra five yards of hard skating being key for the Canucks to look more connected.
"It comes down to this, breakouts, their forecheck, and their neutral zone. I thought they got after it, and we didn't. Quite frankly, we talked about that as a team, I didn't feel we moved our feet to work back to space. And when you do that, you're disconnected, and all of a sudden, they look good. And credit to them, they look good, but I think we made them look good. I think we have to work five yards harder to our spots. That will help our breakouts [and] our neutral zone forecheck, it will make us connected.”
The head coach talked about his team’s work on the penalty kill in the playoffs.
“The PK all year has been a resilient group,” said Tocchet. “We've had some stretches where we've had a bad run a bunch of five on threes. It looks bad, but I think overall, it's been pretty good. Especially from the last couple of years, we've turned the corner. So, the resiliency for me, that group has been big. And I feel with the last couple of games, our clears have been a lot better.”
He went on to give praise to Ian Cole and his work on the penalty kill being something that sparked the team.
“Coler eats three pucks. One off the head, one off the shoulder, one off the collarbone and I’ve seen Coler do that when we won the Stanley Cup. That is why we went and got him, for games like that. That's a lot of courage of him blocking those shots. I mean, those are point-blank. When he blocked those, the next PK, you can see there's a lot of juice on that PK and I think Coler supplied that.”
In the Room
Brock Boeser spoke about embracing the role of the net front guy on the power play.
“I was young when Millsy first got here, and I was learning the whole thing [from him] in a couple of years to really try and be the best that I can be there. But, you know, I think it's just buying into that spot, and really putting in work, that's helped me a lot,” said Boeser.
Carson Soucy spoke on the other side of special teams, discussing the penalty kill’s success in this series.
“Over the year, we just kept building, just kept doing the same thing,” said Soucy. “I think consistency is such a big part. We've stuck with this kill and mostly the same personnel throughout the year. And you just get comfortable with the guys who are going out there. Everyone kind of knows their spots really well. It's just nice to see that pay off. Like I said, we stuck with the same system for pretty much the whole year. So, everyone is pretty confident now and it is showing.”
Soucy also spoke about what his group wants to continue to focus on for game four.
“The forecheck is a big key for us,” he said. “[We were] just kind of playing it safe last game. [It was] the first game on the road in the playoffs. You're just a little tentative, you want to be safer than be aggressive and make that mistake. But we're such a good skating team, we have to skate and be in their face and that takes a confidence level that you kind of work at throughout the whole season. And that's when we're obviously playing our best. We're skating and our forwards are skating forward [and] tracking, that allows us to have good gaps. And I think just for tomorrow, just a big key on that forecheck, getting on them.”
By the Numbers
- The Pius Suter, J.T. Miller and Brock Boeser line continues to dominate possession time in this series. According to NaturalStatTrick, when that line is on the ice, the Canucks have taken 15 shots and only allowed six. Their control of expected goals is sitting at a whopping 87.1% due to their 18 scoring chances created and only four scoring chances allowed.
- Casey DeSmith stopped 29 of the 30 shots he faced in game three and has brought his save percentage up to .911% for the playoffs.
- Quinn Hughes has skated a total of 16.43 kilometres (about twice the height of Mount Everest) through three games.
- Miller leads the Canucks with nine shots on net. He has also created 14 individual scoring chances. Miller has won 62.5% of his faceoffs in the series and many of those draws have been against one of the league’s best, Ryan O’Reilly.
- Dakota Joshua (15), Nikita Zadorov (13), and Phil Di Giuseppe (11) are the three Canucks with double-digit hits through the playoffs.
- Nikita Zadorov has the hardest shot from a Canuck in the playoffs with a 97.32 mph shot in game one.
- Brock Boeser’s arduous work has resulted in him drawing three penalties in three games.
- The power play broke through in game three and buried a couple of goals. The Canucks are now 2/9 with the man advantage.
- Miller has reached the fastest speed for the Canucks through this series – clocking in at 21.79 mph or 35.07 km/h.
Sunday’s game is a 2:00 p.m. PT start time and you can watch the game on Sportsnet or listen to the radio broadcast with Brendan Batchelor on the call with Sportsnet 650 and the Sportsnet Radio Network.
