Monday, January 15, 2024 1:00 P.M. EST
Nationwide Arena, Columbus, OH
TV: Bally Sports Ohio; Radio: 105.7 FM
Vancouver Canucks (29-11-3, 61 points, 1st Pacific, 1st West)
at
Columbus Blue Jackets (13-21-9, 35 points, 8th Metro, 15th East)
It’s a rare afternoon game, and appropriately for this holiday it’s the annual Hockey is for Everyone game at Nationwide. Here is a full list of how the team is celebrating the occasion.
Player to Watch
Elvis Merzlikins
The goaltending saga continues, after the new #1 goalie, Daniil Tarasov, gave up 6 goals on Saturday night against Seattle. That followed a 5 goal effort against Winnipeg on Tuesday. He gets a break today, so Merzlikins gets to make his first start since December 29. Can he pick up where he left off, and earn more starts going forward? Since his last appearance, the team is 1-3-2.
Jackets Notes
Sean Kuraly will return to the lineup today. He also was last seen on December 29, when he left the game with an abdominal injury. The penalty kill really missed him … This was Pascal Vincent’s message to the team at practice yesterday:
“Performance will dictate your job in the future,” Vincent said he told his charges. “You have your jobs today because you’ve done something in the past, but for tomorrow and the next few weeks and the next few months, what you’re doing today will dictate your ice time.”
I don’t trust him one bit.
The Other Bench
Remember when Rick Tocchet was a candidate for the Blue Jackets head coach position in 2021? I was underwhelmed by that prospect at the time, but I have to admit I was wrong. He’s done tremendous work getting the Canucks turned around … The Canucks are at the end of a SEVEN game road trip, which began on January 4. After dropping the first game in St. Louis, they have won five straight … After a 1-0 win in Buffalo on Saturday afternoon, there were concerns that a major winter storm would leave them trapped. Instead, they had to take a little road trip first:
Season Series
01/15/2024 VAN @ CBJ
01/27/2024 CBJ @ VAN
Stats
| Vancouver | Columbus | |
| 3.84 (1) | GPG | 3.00 (22) |
| 2.53 (4) | GAPG | 3.74 (31) |
| 23.2 (12) | PP% | 15.0 (25) |
| 78.7 (20) | PK% | 79.3 (17) |
| 49.3 (19) | 5v5 Shot Attempt % | 47.2 (25) |
| 49.6 (20) | 5v5 Unblocked Shot Attempt % | 47.2 (25) |
| 12.3 (1) | 5v5 Shooting % | 9.9 (3) |
| 92.8 (3) | 5v5 Save % | 90.6 (22) |
| Brock Boeser, 27 | G Leader | Kirill Marchenko, 14 |
| Quinn Hughes, 40 | A Leader | Zach Werenski, 24 |
| J.T. Miller, 58 | P Leader | Johnny Gaudreau, 26 |
| Dakota Joshua, 39 | PIM Leader | Erik Gudbranson, 51 |
| 15-7-2 | Home/Road | 8-12-4 |
| 7-2-1 | Last 10 | 2-4-4 |
Projected Lines
Columbus Blue Jackets
| Johnny Gaudreau | Cole Sillinger | Yegor Chinakhov |
| Kent Johnson | Adam Fantilli | Emil Bemstrom |
| Dmitri Voronkov | Jack Roslovic | Kirill Marchenko |
| Alexandre Texier | Sean Kuraly | Justin Danforth |
| Damon Severson | Adam Boqvist |
| Ivan Provorov | Andrew Peeke |
| Jake Bean | Erik Gudbranson |
| Elvis Merzlikins |
| Spencer Martin |
Vancouver Canucks
| Elias Pettersson | J.T. Miller | Brock Boeser |
| Dakota Joshua | Teddy Blueger | Conor Garland |
| Ilya Mikheyev | Pius Suter | Andrei Kuzmenko |
| Nils Hoglander | Nils Aman | Sam Lafferty |
| Quinn Hughes | Filip Hronek |
| Carson Soucy | Tyler Myers |
| Nikita Zadorov | Ian Cole |
| Thatcher Demko |
| Casey DeSmith |