Thursday, October 8, 2009

At least his family showed up: Canucks 7 Canadiens 1

capt.0934072e0051421588b986ea87bb833b.canadiens_canucks_hockey_vcrd216 Henrik Sedin scores his first of two goals on Wed night. AP photo

Carey Price’s mother and father, Jerry and Linda, and numerous family and friends were in the seats of General Motors place to see the B.C native get his first NHL start in Vancouver.

Unfortunately, the rest of the Montreal Canadiens never showed up to support him.

The Vancouver Canucks walked through Montreal’s defense all night in a 7-1 pounding of the Canadiens.

The Canucks had six odd-man rushes in the first period alone, outshooting Montreal 14-4.

Ryan Kessler opened the scoring, for Vancouver at 13:50, splitting the Canadiens defense and beating Price, who made a valiant effort to attempt to make the save.

Mason Raymond then scored three minutes later, with a great up-ice rush off the boards and going five-hole on Price.

A wide open Steve Bernier closed out the scoring in the first with a power-play goal on a seeing-eye pass from Daniel Sedin.

Despite, outshooting the Canucks 13-0 to start the second period and an Andrei Kostitsyn power-play goal.

Henrik Sedin responded for Vancouver with two goals. The first one came on the power-play and the second coming on a highlight reel two-on-one break.

Michael Samuelsson added to the Vancouver lead at 11:39 of the third period, followed by Alex Burrows scored fourteen seconds later.

Montreal coach Jacques Martin had no choice but to pull the 22-year-old in favor of Jaroslav Halak.

It was a discouraging night for Price, who was 2-0 with a .951 SvPct going into the game.

“It’s right up there with the last road trip we came out here.” Price said noting his and the Canadiens’ struggles during last season’s western Canada road trip, where he only played part of third period in Vancouver.

“I battled as hard as I could. It’s pretty disappointing not being able to play, but this is even more disappointing.”

Price pointed no fingers at his teammates citing no excuses, however coach Martin felt otherwise.

“Carey kept us in,” he said. “I know that he’s disappointed he didn’t have better support from his teammates.”

The Canucks’ Roberto Luongo recovered from Monday’s humiliating 5-3 loss to Columbus on Monday and made 27 saves for the Canucks.

Montreal goes to 2-2 to start the season, while Vancouver racked up their first win in four tries.

The Canadiens will have an early morning practice in Vancouver before heading to Edmonton to prepare for a Saturday night game with the Oilers.

Three Stars: 1. Henrik Sedin  2. Daniel Sedin  3. Roberto Luongo




1 comment:

Yves said...

Last night was a bit painful to watch.

Lot's of defensive mistakes last night. And Weber didn't look at all as comfortable as he looked against Calgary.

The team looked like they lost 2 of their defenseman...

Hoping they can rest up and rebound. We'll see how they face adversity on Saturday.