The Vancouver Canucks will be trying to salvage some pride from a roller-coaster season as they begin their final three-game homestand by hosting the Minnesota Wild on Saturday.
The Canucks (37-29-13, 87 points) will be out for a small measure of revenge against Minnesota. They officially were eliminated from the postseason on Wednesday when the Wild (43-30-7, 93 points) beat the San Jose Sharks 8-7 in overtime. This is the fourth time in the past five seasons the Canucks have missed the playoffs.
Vancouver returns home after winning two straight road games, including a 4-1 victory on Thursday over Colorado. The Avalanche were resting their top scorer Nathan MacKinnon.
The Canucks began the season as a playoff caliber team but the season devolved into internal strife which eventually led to the departure of their leading scorer J.T. Miller.
On Thursday, their top goal scorer Brock Boeser, who can become a free agent, reportedly said it was unlikely he would be back next season.
Goaltender Kevin Lankinen stopped 31 shots on Thursday for the Canucks, who swept the season series from the Avalanche for the first time since 2016-17.
“I thought we played pretty well,” said forward Kiefer Sherwood, who scored the eventual game winner in the second period. “We limited their scoring chances, and I thought we played a pretty stingy game.
“We got a lot of contributions from a lot of guys. It was great game by (Lankinen). It was a good last road game for us.”
Vancouver head coach Rick Tocchet said they want to finish the homestand on a high note. Sherwood and Conor Garland both have 19 goals on the season and would like to reach 20.
“We can’t get into what ifs or what happened?” Tocchet said on Thursday. “The effort is there. I am going to try and play some guys in certain situations. Some guys can get 20 goals which is nice.”
The Wild enter their final road game of the season after failing to clinch a playoff spot on Friday when they lost 4-2 to the Calgary Flames. They wrap up the regular season on Tuesday by hosting Anaheim.
Yakov Trenin and Gustav Nyquist scored the goals against the Flames for Minnesota, which have lost five of their last seven.
The Wild are tied with the St. Louis Blues with 93 points for the first wild-card position in the West. Both teams have two games left on the season. St. Louis plays in Seattle on Saturday.
Minnesota are back at full strength after getting Kirill Kaprizov and Joel Eriksson Ek back from injuries this week. Kaprizov missed 40 of 43 games with an unspecified injury which required surgery in January. Ek missed 21 games with his injury.
Kaprizov and Ek weren’t a factor against the Flames. But they were two nights earlier in their first game back, a thrilling shootout with San Jose where Ek scored four times and Kaprizov scored twice, including the game winner.
“Our team stuck together, grinded, grinded, trying to get points along the way, and everybody’s stepping in trying their best,” said goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury earlier in the week.
Fleury came on in relief late against Calgary for starter Filip Gustavsson and stopped all three shots he faced.
–Field Level Media
