02/28/2011 at 10:54pm EST
From The White Towel at The Province:
Banking on the familiarity that Canucks coach Alain Vigneault had with Lapierre in his QMJHL lineup for three seasons — and what assistant coach Lorne Henning and associate coach Rick Bowness have had with Higgins in the past — the Canucks believe they are better by addition than subtraction.
“Higgins can move up and down the lineup and Lapierre is a third or fourth-line player who can play with some grit and sandpaper and add a different dimension that we currently don’t have,” said Gillis. “If you think you’re close, you have to support it the best you can and these trades make us a little bit better.
“We were determined to not remove anybody from our room on a first-place team and not our core guys. We worked hard the last couple of years to assemble this and it’s hard to replace parts with other parts.”
Here’s a sample of the thoughts some C&B commenters shared about the Lapierre and Higgins trades:
GZ Expat:
All in all…gave up very little to get very little.
Puckhound61:
I like the deals, especially for Lapierre, hopefully he can be a great pest for us and not get to many sin bin sendings.
Daoust:
The Canucks pick up a couple of 3rd/4th line NHLers with decent skill and size, including an agitator which they’ve lacked this year, for basically a couple of AHLers with dropping stock values. Not too shabby.
Myself, I agree with all of them, and from what I’ve heard and read all around the ‘net this afternoon, it sounds like everyone in Canucks land shares pretty much the same opinion.
In summary, here are two deals that are nothing special, but nothing destructive either, and everyone seems to have a cautious view of the potential upside.
(I don’t know what happened while I was on maternity leave, but it sure looks like Canucks fans got very rational and patient while I was away. I’m so proud, but WTF?!? I need to learn how to do that now, ‘patient and rational’?!)
Create an Account
In order to leave a comment, please create an account.