The Vancouver Canucks and the Colorado Avalanche meet in NHL action from the Ball Arena on Thursday night.
The Vancouver Canucks will try to bounce back from a 3-2 overtime loss at the hands of Anaheim in their last game. J.T. Miller leads the Canucks with 15 points including a team-high 6 goals with 9 assists while Quinn Hughes has 12 points with a team-high 10 assists and a team-best +6 plus/minus rating this season. Conor Garland has 11 points with 3 goals and 8 assists and Bo Horvat had 10 points split between 5 goals and 5 assists. Miller and Hughes each have a team-high 6 power play points while Minner and Elias Pettersson each have a pair of power play goals this season. Thatcher Demko’s made the bulk of the starts in goal for Vancouver, going 5-4-1 with a 2.59 GAA and a .918 save percentage this season.
The Colorado Avalanche will be out to rebound from a 4-2 loss to the Columbus Blue Jackets in their last game. Gabriel Landeskog, Naxem Kadri and Nathan MacKinnon each have 10 points with MacKinnon posting a team-high 9 assists while Landeskog leads the Avs with a +6 plus/minus rating this season. J.T. Compher also has a team-high 5 goals as part of his 9 points and Bowen Byram has 8 points with 5 assists this season. Darcy Kuemper has made 8 starts in goal for the Avs, going 4-4 with a 2.89 GAA and a .908 save percentage this season.
Vancouver is 2-5 in their last 7 games overall and 5-2 in their last 7 games as an underdog while the under is 9-1-1 in their last 11 games against the Western Conference. Colorado is 36-17 in their last 53 games overall and 6-2 in their last 8 Thursday games while the over is 11-3-1 in their last 15 games against the Western Conference.
I get the case that could be made both ways in this game, but realistically, I’m going to side with the over here. I think there’s a lot of talent on both sides, and the goaltending has been questionable to put it nicely. Look for the fireworks to be going off at Mile High on Thursday night.