The Vancouver Canucks won for the first time since Jan. 26 and became the first team to shut out the St. Louis Blues this season with a 1-0 win on Wednesday.
That month-long victory drought is a little misleading thanks to the Olympics, but the Canucks are surely glad to end their losing streak at seven games.
The Canucks earned that victory, too, as they out-shot the Blues in every period (35-20 overall) while Eddie Lack ending his own five-game skid by grabbing his third shutout of his rookie season. Jannik Hansen scored the game’s only goal 11:13 into the third period.
Lack called it a “big relief” and Henrik Sedin seemed to agree.
"Huge win. Huge win." - Henrik Sedin pic.twitter.com/N5SkVLOQVb
— Vancouver Canucks (@Canucks) February 27, 2014
#Canucks Henrik Sedin: "In my mind that's maybe the most complete team in the league and we played them well this year and again tonight."
— Cam Tucker (@CamTucker_Sport) February 27, 2014
While the Canucks stumbled into Sochi, the Blues actually looked pretty strong, winning six of eight games before Wednesday’s loss. Head coach Ken Hitchcock likely isn’t thrilled with the work of many aside from Jaroslav Halak, who made at least some case for remaining the Blues’ go-to guy in net by stopping 34 out of 35 shots in defeat.
As of this writing, the Canucks are in the West’s top eight, although that lead might be misleading as Vancouver has 65 points with 21 games remaining while both the Dallas Stars and Phoenix Coyotes sit at 64 points with 24 games left.
Considering the slump Vancouver was on when the NHL’s season was put on pause, that feeling of relief likely overrides the dread of such threats. At least for tonight.