"We've had one win, yes. What about second win?"
The Vancouver Canucks got off the schneid on Thursday, getting their first win of the season thanks to a J.T. Miller goal in overtime against the Florida Panthers. Now it's time for the team to get down to business and string some wins together.
Saturday against the Philadelphia Flyers is a good opportunity to do it, as the team will be looking for revenge after falling in the shootout to the Flyers a week ago. The Flyers have lost three straight since beating the Canucks, though this will be their home opener and they will be extremely motivated to put on a strong performance in front of their hometown crowd.
If the Canucks need any extra motivation, perhaps they can take it from Tyler Myers, who will be playing in the 1000th regular season game of his NHL career. The team showed up to the rink in custom t-shirts designed to look like a concert tour shirt.
"It's an incredible milestone," said head coach Rick Tocchet. "You have to be a guy that's in shape and the way he plays — he's a big guy who blocks a lot of shots — the odds of him playing all these games is hard because he plays a tough game. Quite a milestone for a guy like that and he's a great teammate. That's one thing if you ask me about Myers, the guys will tell you, he's a great teammate."
The Canucks got another emotional boost at the morning skate: Dakota Joshua joined the team on the ice for the first time since his surgery to remove a tumour after his testicular cancer diagnosis. Joshua skated in a non-contact jersey and there's still no timeline for his return but even his teammates seeing him back on the ice could provide a mental bump.
Vancouver Canucks projected lines
The Canucks' lines will change a little bit despite Thursday's win. Arshdeep Bains is expected to come out of the lineup, with Daniel Sprong getting back in after being scratched twice.
Here are the lines from Saturday's morning skate:
Jake DeBrusk was bumped up to the first line with J.T. Miller and Brock Boeser in the third period of each of the last two games, so it's no surprise that he'll start the game on their line against the Flyers.
Nils Höglander and Conor Garland will once again be with Elias Pettersson, a line that was very effective against the Panthers even if they didn't hit the scoresheet. They created some quality chances together and it seems like those are the best wingers the Canucks can play with Pettersson right now.
Sprong will be on a fourth line featuring a couple of responsible defensive forwards in Pius Suter and Nils Åman and will presumably be back on the second power play unit. He's the type of player who can score goals in a depth role; the question is whether he can be responsible enough defensively to avoid giving those goals back in the defensive zone.
On defence, Erik Brännström will play his second game as a Canuck with Derek Forbort still on leave for personal reasons. Brännström was mostly fine in his Canucks debut apart from one major mental mistake that led to a 2-on-0 in front of the net. Fortunately, Kevin Lankinen bailed him out with a magnificent save.
Speak of, Lankinen is expected to be the Canucks' starting goaltender against the Flyers. The Canucks have traded starts between Lankinen and Arturs Silovs in their first four games — this is the first time either will start two games in a row. Lankinen deserves the start, as he's put together two strong performances, only giving up two goals in each of his two starts with a .932 save percentage.
Philadelphia Flyers projected lines
The Flyers will be hungry for a win in their home opener. So far this season, they've had no trouble scoring goals — preventing them has been the issue. The Flyers have given up an average of 4.5 goals per game through their first four games of the season, including six goals against in their last game against the Seattle Kraken on Thursday.
With no morning skate for the Flyers — they just flew in from their road trip on Friday — these are very tentative lines based on how they skated in their previous game. Head coach John Tortorella hasn't been shy about juggling the forward lines, so these could change by game time and will be updated then.
UPDATE: Yep, the lines have changed:
Owen Tippett - Morgan Frost - Matvei Michkov
Joel Farabee - Scott Laughton - Travis Konecny
Tyson Foerster - Jett Luchanko - Bobby Brink
Sean Couturier - Ryan Poehling - Garnet Hathaway
Cam York - Travis Sanheim
Egor Zamula - Rasmus Ristolainen
Erik Johnson - Jamie Drysdale
Sam Ersson
Ivan Fedotov
Sean Couturier has been demoted from second-line centre to fourth-line left wing. That's a pretty significant demotion. It's been five seasons since Couturier won the Selke as the best defensive forward in the NHL.
