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Stick-taps and Glove-drops: Canucks at Ducks, March 14, 2018

Kudos and critiques from tonight's game.
Stick-taps and Glove-drops

Stick-taps and glove-drops is a recurring feature after every Canucks game giving some quick kudos and criticism before the longer I Watched This Game feature. Feel free to leave your own stick-taps and glove-drops in the comments.


The Canucks offence gets the gloves dropped, as well as a rendition of “Taps” played in loving memory of when they last scored a goal: 212 minutes and 9 seconds ago.

I’ll drop the gloves with Bo Horvat on the Ducks’ first goal, as he got caught standing still in the slot as Brandon Montour and Jason Chimera executed a give-and-go. With a better read on the play, Horvat could have been more aggressive stepping up on Montour and prevented the shot attempt from even occurring. Instead, he ended up as another layer in the screen and the shot may have even deflected off his stick past Jacob Markstrom.

A tap of the stick to Alex Biega, who got back into the lineup after it was announced Erik Gudbranson was having season-ending shoulder surgery. Biega, as per usual, injected some instant energy when he stepped onto the ice, tallying five shots on goal and leading the team in shot-attempt differential.

Stick-tap to Reid Boucher, who played well in his limited minutes. He was one of the few Canucks creating legitimately dangerous chances. He set up Michael Del Zotto with a nice pass off the boards, but Del Zotto hit the post. He also took three shots on goal himself. The Canucks out-shot the Ducks 10-5 when Boucher was on the ice at 5-on-5. Not a bad night’s work.

Dropping the gloves with Nic Dowd, who completely misplayed an Alex Edler pass in the defensive zone, leading directly to the Ducks’ second goal. The pass from Edler wasn’t great, but Dowd made it worse, trying and failing to kick the puck up to his stick. Chris Kelly easily knocked Dowd to the ice as he tried to recover, then set up Chimera for the one-timer.

Tyler Motte also gets the gloves dropped on that goal, as he went looking for a hit on Kelly instead of taking stock of the situation and picking up Chimera. Even with the turnover, it wasn’t that dangerous a situation until Motte went chasing after the puck, leaving Derrick Pouliot in the lurch.

Tap of the stick to Brandon Sutter and Jake Virtanen for at least drawing penalties. In a game where nothing much was going right for the Canucks, they contributed, creating a couple power plays, even if they were short-lived.

Jacob Markstrom gets the gloves dropped, not because of his play in net, which was fine, but because of the stupid interference penalty he took that cut short the power play Virtanen drew just 15 seconds earlier. It was an obvious call, as he stepped into Jakob Silfverberg as the Ducks winger tried to skate back into the play.

I would drop the gloves with Alex Edler for his late interference penalty that erased any chance of a comeback, but let’s face it: if you had the chance, you would hit Corey Perry too.

I’m dropping the gloves with Michael Del Zotto, though, for leaving Nick Ritchie all alone in front of the net on that Ducks power play. That gave Ritchie plenty of room to collect a rebound and pass across to Brandon Montour at the backdoor to make it 3-0.