Canucks ready for Wild in Game 2
Canadian Press
4/27/2003
VANCOUVER (CP) - Playing the Minnesota Wild can be like trying to sleep while a tap drips in another room or going to a theatre and having the people in front of you talk through the whole movie.
The Wild are frustrating, irritating.
They are the person at the grocery store whose cart takes up the whole aisle and won't let you pass. They are the car on the freeway that insists on driving slow in the fast lane.
They take up time and space, impeding your progress and stopping you from getting to where you want to go.
"That's our hockey," shrugged defenceman Nick Schultz. "We want to frustrate teams."
The Vancouver Canucks overcame their frustration Friday night to win Game 1 of the Western Conference semifinal when Trent Klatt scored a power-play goal at 3:42 of overtime.
Game 2 of the best-of-seven series will be played Sunday at G.M. Place. The series shifts to Minnesota for games Tuesday and Friday.
The Canucks did a lot of things right against the Wild. They outshoot them 39-21 - including 16-5 in the second period - and at times controlled the game. But the few mistakes Vancouver made quickly turned into a 3-1 Minnesota lead in the third.
That's the Wild's game. Play conservative. Plug up the passing lane like a filter full of dirt. Turn the neutral zone into gridlock, then use their speed to jump on loose pucks.
"It's frustrating if you let it get to you," said Klatt, a Minnesota native who once played for the North Stars before they moved to Dallas. "We knew that's the way they're going to play.
"We knew that they test your patience. They want to see you get frustrated, see you do things you're not usually characterized as doing and they feed on that."
Matt Cooke forced the overtime when he scored with just 1.2 seconds left in the third. Markus Naslund had made it 3-2 on a breakaway after Minnesota forwards Wes Walz and Marian Gaborik collided, coughing up the puck.
"We're not feeling sorry for ourselves," said Walz, who had two goals in the opener. "We're bit going to be dragging our heads around here.
"We're a resilient bunch in our dressing room. Obviously we're disappointed but we'll make adjustments. We need to learn from our mistakes."
Walz makes no apologizes for Minnesota's style. It was good enough to put the third-year franchise into the playoffs and upset the heavily favoured Colorado Avalanche in the first round.
"You can call it frustrating," he said. "We're just trying to play in-your-face hockey.
"We can't let Naslund and (Todd) Bertuzzi look fantastic out there. When they get the puck you want to be in their face and not give them room to skate."<
The Canucks are just as quick as the Wild, but are bigger and probably more talented. But if they hope to win the series, patience might be what they need most.
"We know we're going to have to be patient," said Cooke, who can be as abrasive as sandpaper during a game. "We just have to make sure we stick with our system and play hard.
"We need to chip pucks by, go straight ahead and cycle them down low because that's where we'r'e going to be effective."
Bertuzzi, who often plays like a bull in a china shop, said the Canucks must show finesse and composure.
"You're not going to change a team like that," said Bertuzzi, who has gone four games without a goal. "They won't change.
"You have to deal with it, adapt to it and make the changes."
For the Wild, it will be important not to carry Friday night's disappointment into the second next game.
"We have to forget about it," said Antti Laaksonen, who along with Walz spent much of Friday shadowing Vancouver's top line. "We have to limit those mistakes and play five-on-five.
"You can't dwell on one game whether you win or lose. It's going to be a new game Sunday and we're going to be that much hungrier."
Cheers,
Aquaman
