EDMONTON – It helps in a fight when your goalie is your toughest player.
After the Canucks’ humiliating series-opener against the Vegas Golden Knights, who dominated their opponents on the ice and ridiculed them at the benches, Jacob Markstrom’s mental toughness was evident again on Tuesday when he made 38 saves in Vancouver’s 5-2 win.
And that total was actually exceeded by the saves made by teammates, who blocked 40 shots as the Canucks got up off the canvas to even the best-of-seven playoff series.
Last round, when Vancouver blew its 2-0 series lead against the St. Louis Blues, Canucks coach Travis Green said he loved how his team was standing toe-to-toe against the Stanley Cup champions. The Canucks were in the fight.
But they never got off the ropes in Sunday’s 5-0 loss to Vegas. On Tuesday, the Canucks got into the fight, boosted by the return from injury of winger Tyler Toffoli, who scored on his first shift and finished with three points.
His production was matched by linemate Elias Pettersson, who scored a key goal late in the second period after being chirped as a “little squirt” by the Vegas bench on Sunday.
But the Canucks were still outshot 40-27 on Tuesday, including 22-7 in the second period, when Markstrom dug in and brilliantly kept his team ahead.
“We talked to our group,” Green said after the game. “Call it motivation, call it whatever you want, we had to play better today. We had to have a response. I was confident we’d get a response from our group tonight. We’ve always had it in the past when we haven’t played as well as we should. It doesn’t mean you’re going to win, but I liked that we responded with a better game and evened the series.”
“I thought we responded really well,” Canucks captain Bo Horvat said. “I was proud of the way the guys did. We knew we had to be better. Obviously, they’re a great hockey team and we knew that. We knew we had to come out strong today and we did, and we showed we can play with them. And Marky stood on his head, which obviously was a plus for us as well.”
Horvat was aware of what was being yelled from the Knights’ bench on Sunday. Without fans in Rogers Place, it’s not hard to hear if you can listen through the white noise of the F-bombs.
“We knew how it felt when they were winning, laughing and having a good time on the bench,” Horvat said. “We keep that in the back of our mind for sure. We wanted to come out strong tonight and have a statement, and I thought we did that. Obviously, it was a lot quieter over there. We’re going to try to keep it that way.”
It could have gotten loud in the second period again, but Markstrom stopped 21 of 22 shots in a frame when the shot attempts were 40-9 for the Knights. Incredibly, the Canucks started and ended the period with a two-goal lead.
“It’s huge to keep it a 1-1 period and just build from that, from what we started in the first,” Markstrom said. “Everybody believes in what we did today.
“As a team, we needed to play better than we did in Game 1. Today we did that and it’s obviously huge to get Toff back, and he scores right away. That’s big for our group and our confidence.”
Yes, Toffoli.
Out since the Canucks’ first game of the qualifying round on Aug. 2 due to an ankle sprain, Toffoli scored just 1:29 into the game, sweeping the leftovers from Pettersson’s wrap-around – the Canuck had zoomed past defenceman Shea Theodore – into an open net.
Seven seconds into their first power play, the Canucks made it 2-0 at 10:59 when Toffoli threaded a pass out into the low slot between three Knights and onto the stick of Horvat, who chipped it past goalie Robin Lehner.
Toffoli’s return restored the Canucks’ top six, although Green changed the lines from what they had been at the end of the regular season. Toffoli skated with Pettersson and Tanner Pearson, while J.T. Miller moved alongside Horvat and opposite Brock Boeser.
“Getting the OK from everybody, I got all excited,” Toffoli said of returning to the Stanley Cup tournament. “I felt like I was coming back to my first playoff series. It was fun to get back in the lineup and get a big win and tie the series up.”
After the 2-0 lead came the rest of the game.
With the Golden Knights surging, Alex Tuch cut the deficit in half at 6:34 of the second period after Theodore perfectly lobbed the puck high and out and into the path of streaking teammate Nicolas Roy, who had a step on Hughes.
Then Markstrom made a pile of difficult stops before Pettersson, out of nowhere from an offensive-zone faceoff when he was left uncovered above the crease, took a pass from Alex Edler and badly fooled Lehner with a deke at 18:35.
The Knights may still have been trying to process how they could dominate the second period, yet trail 3-1, when Horvat scored again just 18 seconds into the third, converting Boeser’s pass after Edler’s keep-in at the blue line caught both Vegas defencemen cheating up ice and left a two-on-zero in front of Lehner.
Pearson, into an empty net, and Max Pacioretty exchanged late goals.
In the previous round, the Canucks reduced the Blues’ series to a best-of-three.
Now, their series against the Knights is a best-of-five. Trying to win that is slightly less daunting than staring at a best-of-seven. Understandably, not many would pick the Canucks to win either.
Far better Tuesday than Sunday, the Canucks still could have lost by two or three goals were it not for Markstrom. And even Vancouver’s best may not be good enough to take down Vegas. But at least the Canucks are back in the fight, and demonstrated Tuesday they can deliver some scoring punches even if they can’t stand toe-to-toe with the Golden Knights.
GUADALAJARA, Mexico – Canada’s Marina Stakusic fell 6-4, 6-3 to Poland’s Magdalena Frech in the quarterfinals of the Guadalajara Open tennis tournament on Friday.
The 19-year-old from Mississauga, Ont., won 61 per cent of her first-serve points and broke on just one of her six opportunities.
Stakusic had upset top-seeded Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia 6-3, 5-7, 7-6 (0) on Thursday night to advance.
In the opening round, Stakusic defeated Slovakia’s Anna Karolína Schmiedlová 6-2, 6-4 on Tuesday.
The fifth-seeded Frech won 62 per cent of her first-serve points and converted on three of her nine break point opportunities.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
TORONTO – Alejandro Kirk’s long single with the bases loaded provided the Toronto Blue Jays with a walk-off 4-3 win in the 11th inning of their series opener against the St. Louis Cardinals on Friday.
With the Cardinals outfield in, Kirk drove a shot off the base of the left-field wall to give the Blue Jays (70-78) their fourth win in 11 outings and halt the Cardinals’ (74-73) two-game win streak before 30,380 at Rogers Centre.
Kirk enjoyed a two-hit, two-RBI outing.
Erik Swanson (2-2) pitched a perfect 11th inning for the win, while Cardinals reliever Ryan Fernandez (1-5) took the loss.
Blue Jays starter Kevin Gausman enjoyed a seven-inning, 104-pitch outing. He surrendered his two runs on nine hits and two walks and fanned only two Cardinals.
He gave way to reliever Genesis Cabrera, who gave up a one-out homer to Thomas Saggese, his first in 2024, that tied the game in the eighth.
The Cardinals started swiftly with four straight singles to open the game. But they exited the first inning with only two runs on an RBI single to centre from Nolan Arendao and a fielder’s choice from Saggese.
Gausman required 28 pitches to escape the first inning but settled down to allow his teammates to snatch the lead in the fourth.
He also deftly pitched out of threats from the visitors in the fifth, sixth and seventh thanks to some solid defence, including Will Wagner’s diving stop, which led to a double play to end the fifth inning.
George Springer led off with a walk and stole second base. He advanced to third on Nathan Lukes’s single and scored when Vladimir Guerrero Jr. knocked in his 95th run with a double off the left-field wall.
Lukes scored on a sacrifice fly to left field from Spencer Horwitz. Guerrero touched home on Kirk’s two-out single to right.
In the ninth, Guerrero made a critical diving catch on an Arenado grounder to throw out the Cardinals’ infielder, with reliever Tommy Nance covering first. The defensive gem ended the inning with a runner on second base.
St. Louis starter Erick Fedde faced the minimum night batters in the first three innings thanks to a pair of double plays. He lasted five innings, giving up three runs on six hits and a walk with three strikeouts.
ON DECK
Toronto ace Jose Berrios (15-9) will start the second of the three-game series on Saturday. He has a six-game win streak.
The Cardinals will counter with righty Kyle Gibson (8-6).
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
CALGARY – Mired in their first four-game losing skid in 20 years, the Calgary Stampeders are going back to Jake Maier at quarterback on Saturday after he was benched for a game.
It won’t be an easy assignment.
Visiting McMahon Stadium are the Eastern Conference-leading Montreal Alouettes (10-2) who own the CFL’s best record. The Stampeders (4-8) have fallen to last in the Western Conference.
“Six games is plenty of time, but also it is just six games,” said Maier. “We’ve got to be able to get on the right track.”
Calgary is in danger of missing the playoffs for the first time since 2004.
“I do still believe in this team,” said Stampeders’ head coach and general manager Dave Dickenson. “I want to see improvement, though. I want to see guys on a weekly basis elevating their game, and we haven’t been doing that.”
Maier is one of the guys under the microscope. Two weeks ago, the second-year starter threw four interceptions in a 35-20 home loss to the Edmonton Elks.
After his replacement, rookie Logan Bonner, threw five picks in last week’s 37-16 loss to the Elks in Edmonton, the football is back in Maier’s hands.
“Any time you fail or something doesn’t go your way in life, does it stink in the moment? Yeah. But then the days go on and you learn things about yourself and you learn how to prepare a little bit better,” said Maier. “It makes you mentally tougher.”
Dickenson wants to see his quarterback making better decisions with the football.
“Things are going to happen, interceptions will happen, but try to take calculated risks, rather than just putting the ball up there and hoping that we catch it,” said Dickenson.
A former quarterback himself, he knows the importance of that vital position.
“You cannot win without good quarterback play,” Dickenson said. “You’ve got to be able to make some plays — off-schedule plays, move-around plays, plays that break down, plays that aren’t designed perfectly, but somehow you found the right guy, and then those big throws where you’re taking that hit.”
But it’s going to take a team effort, and that includes the club’s receiving corp.
“We always have to band together because we need everything to go right for our receivers to get the ball,” said Nik Lewis, the Stampeders’ receivers coach. “The running back has to pick up the blitz, the o-line has to block, the quarterback has to make the right reads, and then give us a catchable ball.”
Lewis brings a unique perspective to this season’s frustrations as he was a 22-year-old rookie in Calgary in 2004 when the Stamps went 4-14 under coach Matt Dunigan. They turned it around the next season and haven’t missed the playoffs since.”
“Thinking back and just looking at it, there’s just got to be an ultimate belief that you can get it done. Look at Montreal, they were 6-7 last year and they’ve gone 18-2 since then,” said Lewis.
Montreal is also looking to rebound from a 37-23 loss to the B.C. Lions last week. But for head coach Jason Maas, he says his team’s mindset doesn’t change, regardless of what happened the previous week.
“Last year when we went through a four-game losing streak, you couldn’t tell if we were on a four-game winning streak or a four-game losing streak by the way the guys were in the building, the way we prepared, the type of work ethic we have,” said Maas. “All our standards are set, so that’s all we focus on.”
While they may have already clinched a playoff spot, Alouettes’ quarterback Cody Fajardo says this closing stretch remains critical because they want to finish the season strong, just like last year when they won their final five regular-season games before ultimately winning the Grey Cup.
“It doesn’t matter about what you do at the beginning of the year,” said Fajardo. “All that matters is how you end the year and how well you’re playing going into the playoffs so that’s what these games are about.”
The Alouettes’ are kicking off a three-game road stretch, one Fajardo looks forward to.
“You understand what kind of team you have when you play on the road because it’s us versus the world mentality and you can feel everybody against you,” said Fajardo. “Plus, I always tend to find more joy in silencing thousands of people than bringing thousands of people to their feet.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
