NHL Grind Down: Sunday, February 21st - Page Two
Colorado Avalanche at Vancouver Canucks – 10:00 PM EST
| Colorado Avalanche | Vancouver Canucks | ||||||||
 | Semyon Varlamov |  | Ryan Miller | ||||||
| Record | Record | ||||||||
| 30-26-4 | 22-24-12 | ||||||||
| Stats | GF/GP | GA/GP | PP% | PK% | Stats | GF/GP | GA/GP | PP% | PK% |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Team Stats | 2.65 | 2.77 | 19.50% | 79.60% | Team Stats | 2.29 | 2.83 | 16.90% | 81.10% |
The Avalanche picked escaped Edmonton with a 3-2 victory last night and have now won four of their last five games to climb into the final playoff spot in the Western Conference. They’ll head to Vancouver tonight to take on a struggling Vancouver team really needing to keep things rolling before heading back home for an important two game home-stand. Patrick Roy has really made things tough from a DFS standpoint as he’s spread his top offensive weapons out across three different forward lines. With that said, both Nathan MacKinnon and Matt Duchene have lead the charge for the Avalanche all season. However, it’s been Jarome Iginla putting up the big numbers lately. Iginla has posted points in three straight games and has now tallied four goals and six assists in nine games since the all-star break. On defense, Tyson Barrie erupted for two goals and an assist against the Oilers last night and has now posted 10 goals and 30 assists in 57 games this season. He’s taken over as the quarterback of the top power-play unit and remains underpriced on several sites.
The Canucks have somehow dropped four straight 5-2 decisions and have now posted an ugly 2-7-1 record over their last ten games. This team is clearly in need of some kind of rebuild and will likely be sellers at the approaching trade deadline. While they’re very tough to trust as a whole, it’s still hard to ignore both Henrik and Daniel Sedin on the top forward line. Daniel puts a four game point streak on the line this evening and leads the team with 22 goals and 27 assists. His brother Henrik has added a goal and four assists over the last five games and has posted 23 points in 26 home games this season. Digging much deeper than those two should be reserved for GPP only use. With Alex Edler out of commission for the next six weeks, Ben Hutton has seen a major increase in his workload. While he hasn’t done much offensively, he’s logged over 23 minutes in each of the last three games and sees a healhy dose of playing time on the point of the top power-play unit.
Colorado Avalanche
CF%: 43.1, CP60: 110, 5×5 Differential: -10
Elite Options: Nathan MacKinnon, Matt Duchene, Jarome Iginla, Tyson Barrie
Secondary Options: Gabriel Landeskog, Blake Comeau, Carl Soderberg, Erik Johnson
Vancouver Canucks
CF%: 47.3, CP60: 103.4, 5×5 Differential: -12
Elite Options: Daniel Sedin, Henrik Sedin
Secondary Options: Jannik Hansen, Bo Horvat, Ben Hutton