Vancouver-San Jose' Game 2; Interesting Stats

The Canucks took a commanding 2 games to none lead over the Sharks with their game 2 7-3 win tonight. Vancouver was unstoppable especially on the powerplay where they went 3/9. The Sharks committed a ton of penalties. Ryan Clowe, Ben Eager, and Scott Nichol were all given game misconducts in the third period. There was a big fight by the end of the game that gave Ben Eager a 2 minute penalty for cross checking (and a misconduct for Eager), Scott Nichol a 2 minute penalty for roughing (and a misconduct for Nichol), and misconducts for Vancouver's Maxime Lapierre, Jannik Hansen, and Aaron Rome. All of this happened with just 9 seconds left in the game.

Eager himself had an interesting night. He had 3 penalties and then scored a petty goal with a few minutes remaining in the game to make the Sharks' deficit to 4 goals. Upon scoring, he leaned down over the net and said a few words to goalie Roberto Luongo.

After everything was cleared up, he received a 2 minute penalty for roughing. A few minutes later he received another penalty for cross checking and a game misconduct. So in all, Eager had one goal and 20 penalty minutes. This may possibly draw a suspension because most of his penalties were unnecessary but I'm not sure if the leagues going to do it because the Sharks are probably not going to play him for the next game or two. But we'll see.

The Sedin Twins also had a sick game [they weren't the best twins in the game though (viewer discretion is advised) http://sports.yahoo.com/nhl/blog/puck_daddy/post/Video-The-Girl-Who-Flashed-Ben-Eager-in-the-pen?urn=nhl-wp5198&utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter] Henrik Sedin (later named 3rd star of the game) had 3 points (all assists) and was a +1 rating. Daniel Sedin had 2 points (all goals) and was also a +1 rating. It appears that Vancouver has finally found the perfect mix of star power and secondary scoring. Daniel and Henrik Sedin and Ryan Kesler have all found their playoff game while guys like Raffi Torres (1 goal tonight) and Chris Higgins (a goal and 2 assists tonight) have picked up their play as well. This is a deadly combination in the postseason and they look like a legitimate cup winner.

Now I want to talk about Kevin Bieksa. The guy played great for the Canucks tonight with just about 19 minutes of ice time. He was effective on the ice and won a big, rare fight in the second period against Patrick Marleau:

(courtesy hockeyfights.com) Not only that though, he scored in the scored in the second period and eventually added on an assist for the Gordie Howe hattrick (where a player scores a goal, gets an assist, and gets in a fight all in the same game.)

(courtesy NHL)

 This is unofficially one of the greatest stats in all of sports because it shows the different strengths a player needs to have to succeed in this league.

Anyway, my favorite highlight of Bieksa tonight was in the first period with his team up 2-1 and the Sharks were on the powerplay. After a close bank shot attempt from Joe Thornton, the refs try to find the puck in the net. Bieksa quickly tried to put his foot in the net to block the in-net-camera from any visible shot of the puck.  It's happened before that a play on the ice couldn't have been overturned because of a body perfectly blocking all camera angles. But I've NEVER seen it been done on purpose. (happens at 0:10 and then he skates away at 0:14)

(Courtesy to bestdanghockeygoals. once again like his page on facebook. great guy)

So to sum it up, this was an eye opening, bizarre game on many fronts. But a happy ending for Vancouver.