from Iain MacIntyre of Sportsnet,

After nine days between games, the Vancouver Canucks emerged from the National Hockey League break the same first-place team that went into it. Well, not quite the same.

Now they have centre Elias Lindholm, so they may be even better.

After a blockbuster trade with the Calgary Flames last week – while Lindholm was on holiday in Mexico – the 29-year-old Swede scored twice in his Canucks’ debut on power-play tips and Vancouver beat the Carolina Hurricanes 3-2 on Tuesday to re-ignite their hot streak.

The Canucks are 10-0-2 since Jan. 4. Lindholm became the first player to score twice in his Canuck debut since Esa Tikkanen 28 years ago, and Vancouver goalie Thatcher Demko won his ninth straight start to tie Dan Cloutier’s franchise record from 2002.

“My role is to help the team both ways,” Lindholm said. “Obviously. . . hasn't gone the way offensively I wanted (this season). But I'm happy to be here. I have a good opportunity to do something special here with this group. It's always nice to score and, like I said, there hasn't been too many this year. So it's nice.

“There's a lot of good players on this team. For me, it was kind of easy tonight. I didn't have to do too much. They made it easy for me.”

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