NHL ON TSN QUIZ: DISSECTING EVERYTHING ABOUT THE CANUCKS
Question No. 1: What is Vancouver's single greatest strength: goaltending, defence, scoring depth or special teams?
McKenzie: I will say scoring depth. When you've got the Sedins, you've got a great base to build on. You've got Kesler after that. There are always question marks after Kesler of who's going to get goals: is it going to be Mason Raymond? Is it going to be (Mikael) Samuelsson? Will (Raffi) Torres score? But between them all, they manage to get it done. Vancouver and Detroit, the top two offences in the league.
Peca: I'm going special teams. When you talk about winning and losing hockey games, special teams play a big part of that. I know on their penalty kill, being the number one faceoff team in the National Hockey League goes a long way for that number to be where it is. If they can continue this trend in the playoffs, they're going to be tough to beat.
Ward: Goaltending. You never hear about a player standing on his head, stealing a game or stealing a series. They have two bona fide starters there, a 1A and a 1B.
Question No. 2: Six of the last seven President's Trophy winners have failed to win the Stanley Cup: is it coincidence or cause-and-effect?
Ward: Coincidence. Never a detriment or fall back or something negative to be the best team in the league whether in the playoffs or the regular season. I think it's purely a bad question on the part of the Quiz Master – this is the type of stuff you use to fill radio talk shows with.
McKenzie: Cause-and-Effect. You get a first place team and they go through and they cruise and there's no adversity, that sometimes comes back to bite them. But in the Vancouver Canucks case, the reason they can overcome it, is because they have had adversity and the fans of Vancouver know that. Two times against Chicago, Dallas … lots of adversity, they'll overcome that.
Peca: I'm going coincidence also. I can go back to '06 when we beat the Detroit Red Wings who were the President's Cup team. It becomes about matchups: yes, they're the best team in the regular season, but too many teams are good enough and smart enough and coached well enough that when they get in the postseason, they know it's a clean slate.
Question No. 3: If you were the Vancouver Canucks, who would you fear the most in the first round: Anaheim, Chicago, LA or Nashville?
McKenzie: I'll take the Chicago Blackhawks and the psychological factor. Yes, the Blackhawks, they're not the same team that they have been in the past. But they still have Jonathan Toews, they've still got lots of players that can elevate their game, and the Vancouver Canucks, just the psychology of it. I think that would be a bugaboo.
Ward: I gotta go with Anaheim. I feel like, answer the question in nets about where they're going to go with it, what direction and I feel most solid about that decision. They're durable, they're rugged, they're built for the grind, they have experience in the locker room when it comes to the Stanley Cup. And Lubomir Visnovsky is the guy that answers the questions when it comes down to: who fulfills the role of Scott Niedermayer in the playoffs?
Peca: I'm going with Chicago. Until Vancouver can show they can overcome the mental hurdle of the Chicago Blackhawks, I think it's going to be tough for them to move on. Yes, they can believe in themselves, they've had a great regular season, but once you get in a series – if they end up facing the Chicago Blackhawks it's hard to eliminate those doubts in their mind.
Question No. 4: Henrik and Daniel Sedin are the best pitch-and-catch combination in sports since a) Joe Montana / Jerry Rice, b) Steve Carlton / Tim McCarver or c) John Stockton and Karl Malone?
Peca: I'm going with Stockton and Malone. When you think of the success of the Utah Jazz, they went as Stockton and Malone went. And much like the Vancouver Canucks, their success is predicated on the twins, Henrik and Daniel. If they're not going, if they're not at the top of their game, the team isn't successful.
McKenzie: I'll say Montana and Rice, and I'll say this is a dumb question. Because you don't ask somebody who's as one-dimensional, knows only a little bit about hockey and nothing else about anything else to answer the question. But I just looked at it and said, well, Jerry Rice seems like a nice guy.
Ward: Malone and Stockton. They have symbiotic relationships. Both guys had passers and both had finishers. They both can find each other no matter where they are on the floor or the ice. They seem to have that innate ability to understand each other's game.
|
