Rob The Hockey Guy

I was twelve years old when Jim Robson famously called “the Vancouver Canucks are going to the Stanley Cup FINAL!” after Greg Adams’ famous goal in 1994. And now 17 years later, a new generation has a iconic call of their own (give kudos to John Shorthouse, he wasn’t fooled). It wasn’t pretty, but the Canucks were the best team in this series versus the Sharks, and deserve it. This team keeps winning, and they keep doing it in different ways. Lets review how it all went down last night:

Shots, Shots, Shots…

The Canucks were outshot in every period of the game, except for double overtime. They didn’t direct nearly enough pucks towards the net all night long, save for maybe the tying and winning goals. The Sharks on the other hand directed 56 shots on goal. Roberto Luongo was spectacular and this performance will go a long way to show everyone that he is indeed a big game goalie. He was the first star, and stole the game.

Kesler the Warrior

Jim Robson famously said that Trevor Linden “will play on crutches” and Ryan Kesler wasn’t far off that last night. He clearly injured his leg midway through the game and looked like he was on one leg for the rest of the night. Despite this, he wasn’t a liability defensively and scored a big goal to tie the game with 14 seconds left.

Bad Breaks

The Canucks got their share of bad breaks in game 5. The first Sharks goal was scored off a weak point shot that Keith Ballard whiffed on with his glove, fooling Roberto Luongo. The second Sharks goal was aided by a bouncing puck getting over Henrik Sedin’s stick. I thought the Canucks also got completely jobbed in the first overtime period with non-calls on the Ian White trip/clip and the high stick on Mason Raymond. Both are automatic penalties in my mind, no matter what time of the game.

Good Breaks

Obviously the Canucks got their share of good breaks as well. They benefited from an icing call that went off a Canuck just before the tying goal in the last minute of the third period. They also got away with a high stick in overtime (since when do high sticking penalties get let go seemingly on purpose?). And of course, the break of all breaks, the bounce off the stanchion that fooled everyone except for Kevin Bieksa.

The Stanchion

It was probably the biggest play by an inanimate object since the inanimate carbon rod. Now you can even follow @theStanchion on Twitter. Remember the “hand of god” goal by Maradona? Maybe we’ll start calling this the “bounce of god”. In any case, the hockey gods sure were shining down on the Canucks last night.

Did Henrik Touch it?

By “it”, we mean the Clarence Campbell Bowl, and no, Henrik Sedin didn’t touch it. It’s kind of a funny tradition now, but it’s something that everyone looks for when the conference trophies are handed out. I would have been fine with Henrik picking up the trophy (just don’t drop the top like Linden did).

The Party

What a party it was on the streets of Vancouver last night. Fans filled the streets and one can only dream about what it will look like if they can win it all.