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ST. PAUL, Minnesota (Ticker) -- A change in scenery did the trick for the Vancouver Canucks, while a change in the calendar proved a bad omen for the Minnesota Wild. Todd Bertuzzi, Trevor Letowski and defenseman Ed Jovanovski scored in a 68-second span of the second period and the Canucks ended a four-game winless streak with a 4-2 victory over the Wild, who had a six-game unbeaten run halted. Vancouver was coming off a winless four-game homestand that dropped it below .500 for the first time in 10 months. Taking to the road proved the tonic for the Canucks, who got a big effort from the No. 1 line of Bertuzzi, Markus Naslund and Brendan Morrison. Bertuzzi had a power-play tally and two assists, Naslund contributed an insurance goal and an assist and Morrison set up a goal. "We've played well on the road, we haven't played particularly well at home," said Vancouver coach Marc Crawford, whose team improved to 3-0-2 away from GM Place. "We just have to keep it going." Marian Gaborik had a goal and an assist for the Wild, who opened November with a loss, matching their total for all of October (8-1-2-0). "I don't think we had the same patience, shooting before we had guys to the net," said Minnesota center Cliff Ronning, who also contributed a goal and an assist. "We let him (Dan Cloutier) see the puck a lot, and he's a good goalie when he sees it." Things started promisingly enough for Minnesota, which grabbed the lead just over eight minutes into the first period as Gaborik spun in the right faceoff circle and whipped a backhander past Cloutier for his seventh goal. But Bertuzzi started the Canucks' outburst with a power-play tally at 9:24, flipping a shot from above the crease that trickled past previously unbeaten goaltender Manny Fernandez. Vancouver took the lead 27 seconds later when Letowski got a carom off the end boards and beat Fernandez from a tight angle. Jovanovski capped the explosion at 10:32 by firing a slap shot from the right circle inside the far goalpost. "I was wondering when it was going to stop," Minnesota coach Jacques Lemaire said. "This is what you have to be careful with when a team gets a goal. The line that takes over, they need a good shift that would reverse the pressure. We made a lot of bad decisions with the puck, where we were going to pass it." "The three goals, I don't understand, I really don't," said Fernandez, who started the season with a record-tying six-game winning streak. "Maybe I wasn't prepared as well for the first period. There's going to be nights like that where it's going to be harder. You have to work through it." Minnesota got back a goal before the end of the period as Ronning scored with 4:27 to go. But Bertuzzi, who was double-shifted throughout, set up Naslund's insurance tally midway through the third. "We worked hard on what we had to do to be successful tonight," Bertuzzi said. "That was the key - get in traffic and get shots on net and getting after the second and third chances. I think we got a handful of them on net." "Todd played well with the extra time," Crawford added. "You need your best players to be good to win, and our best players were good tonight." The game was Vancouver's first since trading center Harold Druken and left wing Jan Hlavac to Carolina for enforcer Darren Langdon and defenseman Marek Malik. Langdon was used sparingly while Malik logged just over 16 minutes. |
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