Vancouver Edges Boston 4-3 In Grudge Match

Canucks Score 4 Power Play Goals In Most Exciting Game of the Year!

In a time when few things in life (never mind sports) live up to their hype, yesterdays game between the Vancouver Canucks and the Boston Bruins did just that.  The game pretty much had it all, except a happy ending for Bruins fans, as they lost 4-3 to the Canucks on home ice and may have lost Brad Marchand for a few games, as he awaits a hearing with the league for his clip on Sami Salo.  The Canucks got all of their offense on the Power Play, scoring 4 times in 11 chances.  The Bruins, meanwhile were less disciplined than they were during the Finals and they paid the price.  The big blow was a 5 minute power play, courtesy of a dirty hit by Brad Marchand, for the Canucks in which they scored their 3rd and 4th goals of the day, which the Bruins couldn’t recover from.

Coming into the game, the big story was Roberto Luongo ducking out of this game.  No matter what they want you to believe, Luongo could have started if he wanted.  Typical Canucks!

Before the game was 4 minutes old, the bad blood from last springs Stanley Cup Finals had already boiled over.  During a line change, Alex Burrows gave a love tap with his stick to Daniel Paille‘s skates, which Shawn Thornton returned with a little more force.  At this point Burrows stuck his stick in the throat of Thornton and that was it.  Thornton immediately went after Burrows, with Burrows coiling like he shot and it was on.  What happened next was a complete mess!  Remember this was when both teams were changing lines.  First, 3 Canucks went after Thornton.  Then another.  Then Maxime Laperierre, in typical gutless fashion, and one more Canuck jumped on the pile.  If my math is correct that’s 6 on 1.  And this is where it gets interesting.  Milan Lucic, who had just gotten on the ice during the line change, took one step onto the bench, then saw Thornton being pig-piled by the Canucks and came charging to his defense.