Game Three: Canucks Silence United Center

Woooo!

Yesterday I checked the temperature in Vancouver, and the sky was falling. Fans started to get nervous, and people were getting ready to jump off the band wagon. The Canucks faced adversity playing against the Blackhawks and lost home ice. Going into the United Center, last night was going to be a hard game to play. Not only were we coming off of a loss in Vancouver, but we had a rash of injuries (Salo and Demitra).

A quick penalty in the first was taken by Vaananen on a cross check on Kane sent a message to the Hawks being in Luongo's kitchen. The first powerplay, the Blackhawks came on strong and after 4 attempts, the Canucks were still not able to clear the puck out of the zone. But 1 minute into the powerplay, Byfuglien took the Hawks off of the pp. Later in the period, from a pinch from Bieksa, to a pass to Kesler, which made Khabibulin commit to Kesler who made a quick no look pass to Mason Raymond, who went top shelf and scored! Man that was a run on sentence. Usually you look for the other team to respond after a goal, instead Bolland takes a delay of game penalty. Patrick Kane takes a late penalty that will carry on to the 2nd.

During the Kane penalty in the 3rd, Bernier was able to knock in a rebound from a shot from Alex Edler, it's 2-0. Silence in the United Center. Kesler did what needed to be done on Kane, go hard on him against the boards. Both Kesler and Brouwer head off to the box. Henrik Sedin gets a wrist shot on Khabibulin and the puck trickles through Bulin's 5-hole into the net, 3-0. 2 minutes later Daniel Sedin takes a retarded penalty, tripping on a puck that would have been icing. Brian Campbell who has been skating like he's in the ice capades tonight gets a goal, crap 3-1.

The third begins with another dumb delay of game penalty from Edler. We all know how safe a 2 or 3 goal lead is when playing the Blackhawks, so here is the game changer powerplay for Chicago. Luongo makes a great save on Bolland. Later in the period, Raymond gets ANOTHER delay of game penalty, that's 3 tonight combine for both teams, but the Canucks kill it off. The rest of the period had the Hawks try to make a come back, but the team just couldn't rally back like they did in game 1 and 2. The fans in the United Center were quiet through much of the 3rd period.

Notes:
-Pyatt was back on the 3rd line playing a strong game after missing games due to the death of his fiancee
-the Canucks' defense was playing much better tonight and moved the puck well
-Bieksa played a strong 27:54 and really showed that he could step up his game
-Bieksa's D pairing, Shane O'Brien also played a solid game
-the Blackhawks' powerplay didn't look good. They kept passing and looking for the perfect shot and were not able to get pucks on net.
-Duncan Keith played a terrible game
-Patrick Kane only played 14:22 (with only 2:56 in the 2nd period), and Toews 16:36
-Nice punch from Burrows on a Hawk player on the bench, and then the stick back in the face of Burrows.

Next game: Thursday in Chicago, Canucks are up 2-1 in the series.

6 wins down. 10 to go.