Canucks goaltender Roberto Luongo, right, is congratulated by captain Markus Naslund after a Vancouver victory in late November. (Richard Lam/Canadian Press)
Feature
Division dominators
The Vancouver Canucks' long-term success depends on spreading around the victories
Last Updated Fri., Dec. 7, 2007
By Tony Care, CBC Sports
In the NHL, it's just not about winning the division battles.
A sparkling division record can only take a team like the Vancouver Canucks so far, especially when it comes time to compete for the Stanley Cup.
"The division games are very important because there are eight against each team," said Hockey Night in Canada's Jim Hughson, who's covered the team on a regular basis since 1994.
"But when you look the standings, it's all about conference. Playing a team like Chicago is just as important as any game in the Northwest, because winning the division will only get them the third seed. You still have to worry about conference games."
The Canucks have mostly built their slim advantage on the strength of their superiority versus division rivals, holding a commanding 9-1-2 mark against Minnesota, Edmonton, Colorado and Calgary.
"They're all high-intensity games to begin with," goaltender Roberto Luongo said during a recent conference call.
"Every team in our division is a good team. Everybody's got a chance to win the division. We know all those games are of high importance. For some reason we play well against them. We just have to make sure that on a nightly basis, when we do play a divisional team, we're ready to play."
Yet the remainder of the Canucks' record tells a different story. Vancouver is only 8-11 against the rest of the NHL, including a 6-7 mark with the other Western Conference teams.
The surging Canucks (16-10-2) rebounded from a slow start to lead the Northwest Division over the Minnesota Wild by two points.
Division games make up 40.2 per cent of the schedule, meaning the Canucks can't simply rely on their dominating Northwest record to remain in contention for one of top two spots in the West.
Hughson doesn't believe the Canucks are an inferior team when pitted against the rest of their Western Conference foes and thinks the less-than-flattering record is a bit misleading.
A stellar record
In October, Vancouver struggled with every facet of the game and by the end of the month, finished with a 5-7 mark, with all defeats coming from teams not in the Northwest Division.
November didn't begin much better as the Canucks not only were beaten 3-0 by the Nashville Predators, they lost defencemen Sami Salo and Kevin Bieksa in that game, and were already playing without blue-liner Lucas Krajicek.
Vancouver also played four games without the services of Mattias Ohlund, who was suspended for a wicked slash on Minnesota's Mikko Koivu on Nov. 16.
Despite these potentially devastating losses, the Canucks were one of the best teams in the NHL, storming to a 9-2-2 record for the month as six of those victories came against Northwest opponents.
But Hughson reasons that it wouldn't matter who Vancouver was playing at the beginning of the season, the team simply wasn't competing to its capabilities. The Canucks' hot streak in November also should be credited with their strong play, not the competition.
"If you look at their schedule it's about when they were playing well and when they weren't playing well," said Hughson. "To me there's no rhyme or reason to it. It's not like they're a better team when they play within the Northwest Division.
The Canucks have proven that point as they head forward into December. The team has won five of its last six games - all against other Western Conference clubs. Vancouver also seems to have straightened out its problems from its early stretch due to a return to discipline hockey.
"They deserved their poor record at the start of the season," said HNIC analyst Kelly Hrudey. "The Canucks were not playing anywhere near the style that they're playing now or the end of last season. But now they're starting to play a team game and that's when this squad is at its best. They're incredibly well-coached and individually, players have bought into the coach's philosophy."
Of course, it doesn't hurt to have one of the best goaltenders in the league, with Luongo powering Vancouver's charge up the standings.
The Quebec native has been on quite a role recently, posting three straight shutouts and holding teams scoreless for a franchise record 210 minutes, 34 seconds.
As long as Luongo is between the pipes, it wouldn't surprise some hockey observers if Vancouver's record against the rest of the league slowly points to the direction of its division mark.
"I can almost guarantee you that if they play as well as they did in the month of November through December and January, then you're going to look at their record in the conference and it's going to be even with their division," concluded Hughson. "You're not going to look at it and say 'Geez, they can't play outside of the division.'"
