Halford & Brough in the Morning - The Best of Halford and Brough 12/02/25

Episode Date: December 2, 2025

Mike & Jason look back at the previous day in sports, plus they preview tonight's Canucks matchup at Colorado with radio commentator Brendan Batchelor. This podcast is produced by Andy Cole and Greg Balloch. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rogers Media Inc. or any affiliate.

You're listening to the best of Halford and Brough. You're listening to the best of Halford and Brough. You know, I love Jordan Bennington. The line of tech the test determined, that was a lot. Marcus Jones, he's under between the hash marks at the 6th. Runs at left to the 15, to the 20, accelerates 30, 3, 5, 40, beating given off the heading, come on the near side, 40, to the 30. Marcus Jones, going to the 20, to the 10, to the house.

Touchdown, Patriots. Good morning, Vancouver, 601 on a Tuesday. Happy Tuesday, everybody, is Halford, it is, broff. It is Sportsnet 650. We are coming you live from the Kintech Studios and beautiful Fairview Slopes in Vancouver. Jason, good morning. Good morning. Adol, good morning to you.

Good morning. Lattie, good morning to you as well. Hello, hello. Halper and Brough of the morning is brought to you by Sands and Associates. Score a debt freedom hat trick. One, no more interest, two much lower payments and three financial peace of mind. Visit them online at sands-trustee.com. We are right now, our one of the program. Hour 1 is brought to by North Star Metal Recycling.

Vancouver's premier metal recycler pays the highest prices on scrap metal. North Star Metal Recycling, they recycle. You get paid. Visit the 1170 Powell Street in Vancouver. We are coming to you live from the Kintech Studio. now's the time to maximize the benefits of custom orthotics. Before the year runs out, visit kintech.net. It is the Duick morning drive right now.

It is rerun through today's guest list on the Halford & Brough show on Sportsnet 650. It is brought to you by the Dewick Auto Group. It's a big one today. Guest list today begins at 6.30. Greg Wischinski, our ESPN NHL Insider. We'll join us tonight. Five games in the NHL last night, 10 tonight, including the Canucks and Avs. We'll talk about that with Wish at 630.

7 o'clock. Brandon Batchelor connects play-by-playman. He'll be on the call for tonight's game. That's 6 o'clock puck drop from Ball Arena in Denver. That's at 7 o'clock. At 7.30, Yesper Sorensen is going to join the program. Manager of your Vancouver Whitecaps. Whitecaps stake on Inter Miami on Saturday in the MLS Cup final. Yves joins us today at 7.30.

They fly tomorrow to Miami ahead of the big match. 8 o'clock. Araf Dean is going to join the program. He's an Aves beatwriter from Colorado Hockey. We've had them on the show a few times before. The aves host the Canucks tonight. The Aves are 10, 0, and 2 at home this year. And their last overtime loss was in October.

They are very good at home. But they haven't played the Canucks at home yet. No, that's a totally different challenge. And then it might be easier than the other ones. Araf's going to join us at 8 to preview things. How do we look interested on the ice right now? Some will call it a challenge. Some won't.

We'll ask ARIF. No, we won't. Why are they skating after the puck? It's so easy. There's so much room out there. Eric is going to join us today. We have more stuff to get into. 7.30 this morning, we're giving away a $50 gift card to White Spot.

We're doing that every day this week. Call our number 5 at 730 is going to win the $50 gift card to White Spot. 604-280650. At 8 o'clock, we're doing Halford-imbrough's 12 days of Christmas here on SportsNet 650. If you listen every day until December 16th, we're going to be giving away secret prizes every show. Yesterday was Maui Jim sunglasses. Today, I can't tell you until the prize has been announced. But at 8 a.m., we're going to be giving away the day two of Halford & Brough's 12 days of Christmas.

You know what's going to be really frustrating for the Canucks is one of the days we're going to give away a really good second line center. Just give it away? Yeah, we've got one. Just like that. We found one. I went to Pew Souter? Yeah, it was actually, it was actually really easy to find. It wasn't hard at all.

It didn't cost that much either. I don't know. We kept some money aside for one, and we found one. And lo and behold. Okay, so I will remind everybody about our contests during the show, but they are at 8 and 7.30. That's what's happening on the program today. Lots to get into.

Without further ado, Laddy, let's tell everybody what happened. Hey, did you guys see the game last night? No. No. What happened? I missed all the action because I was. We know how busy your life can be. What happened?

Miss it? You missed that? What happened? What happened is brought to you by the BC Construction Safety Alliance. Making safety simpler by giving construction companies invest in tools, resources, and safety training. Visit them online at BCCSA.ca. We will begin with the Vancouver Canucks ahead of tonight's game 6 o'clock from Ball Arena in Denver. The Canucks actually practiced in El Segundo yesterday in California before flying out to Denver for tonight's game.

A couple news and notes from yesterday's practice. Nils Hoaglander returned and joined the group for the first time since suffering that ankle injury in the preseason. He appeared on the ice in a non-contact jersey. That was rosier news for the Vancouver Canucks than what they got on the Connor Garland front. Connor Garland, unlike Nils Hoaglander, did not skate with the team

after sitting out Saturday's loss to the Kings with an undisclosed injury. I guess Adam Foote told reporters that they wouldn't have an update on Garland until he was seen by team doctors back in Vancouver. So using the powers of deductive logic means he probably won't play tonight when they take on the aves in Colorado.

I think he might already be in Vancouver. And IMAQ had a good chat with Brock Besser, who tonight will find himself on a line with David Kempf and Kiefer Sherwood, which he probably didn't intend to start the story. Do you think he had any idea? Any idea that it would be like this. In training camp?

I don't think so. This is still the second line. It's not like, you know, Brock has been knocked down to the third or fourth line because he's not playing well. I think Brock is playing quite well, actually. He's getting opportunities. There's one game a couple games ago

where he had a bunch of chances to score. Didn't, but then next game, he does score. You're looking at the Kinex top six right now? David Kamp is the second line center again with Sherwood and Besser on his wings and then you got Petey

between Jake DeBrusk and Evander Cain and you're going up against the Colorado Avalanche it's going to be tough you know I think there's two ways

that the Canucks get wins these days and one is if they get a really good goaltending performance and two is if they win the special teams battle which is why there was so much

frustration in San Jose the other day when they went, what was it, 0 for 6 or 0 for 7 on the power play, didn't have any answers there and they end up losing the game. That's kind of the formula, right? Like you have to get power plays and you have to

take advantage of them because that's where the Canucks can get their key players all together out on the ice with the first unit. Right. And you know... It's night to be at evens. And if you know, if there is dysfunction on that power play

and at times there does look like there is, then it's going to be even worse for the Canucks. Overall, their power play has actually been fine this season. But, you know, that's how they're going to win games because it is in it evens. And when you look at the lineup, it's easy to see why. So the article that you're talking about, IMAX on the road with the Vancouver Canucks right now,

and I believe the genesis of his article stemmed from a Canucks Army report in which Canucks Army wrote a piece, highlighting, and I'm using that term very loosely, but highlighting that in 26 games, all the different second line centers that the Vancouver Canucks have used this season have contributed one secondary assist this season.

That's how many is it? One. Brock Besser, the winger oftentimes on that second line, now playing left wing, which is a rarity as well, has seven primary assists. So, IMAC decided, hey, I'm on the road, why not, you know, dive into this a little bit further? He asked Adam Foote yesterday about the team's chance generation.

It is actually kind of amazing that the Vancouver Canucks have scored the amount of goals that they have this season and have generated the amount of chances that they have, despite getting literally zero, not literally because there's one, almost zero from the second line center position, which, as you know, having covered the game quite thoroughly over the last decade or so, it's very important to have a good contributing second line center. Well, there's a team we're going to talk about in just a bit, the Winnipeg Jets that they have a 2C problem as well. There's a lot of teams out there that are looking for second line centers and nobody's doing deals right now. Anything else on the Canucks note?

Should we talk about the Aves at all or should we wait to speak with Araf about that? I mean, if you haven't been paying attention at home in listener land there, this is the best team in the National Hockey League. they are first overall in the NHL standings with 42 points to put that in perspective they are four points clear of the second best team Dallas their divisional foe and they have a game in hand

on Dallas they're 181 and 6 they have lost one game in regulation this season they're 10 and 2 at home they suffered a rare loss on Friday to Minnesota in a shootout and Minnesota's playing well though and they were so furious about it that they went out the next night and blew the doors absolutely beat the break

off of Montreal 7 to 2. And now they've just been sitting there waiting for the Vancouver connects to roll through. So Kevin Lankan will get the start tonight and he'll be backed up by Patera because there's been more back and forth between some of the goalies. Tolo Pilo is back in town reportedly

because his wife is in labor. Yeah, she went into labor early so he's returned to Vancouver for the pending birth of his child, which means presumably Lankanin gets the start and yeah, you mentioned you're... I don't think foot's going to be like, I've got a hunch tonight. Let's try this Patera guy. It worked out last time.

That would be the textbook dictionary definition of throwing somebody to the wolves. Okay, so there's a couple of teams I want to talk about who aren't the Canucks and aren't the Colorado Avalanche. One is the Winnipeg Jets and the other is the St. Louis Blues,

specifically Jordan Bennington. Let's start with the Jets who lost again last night. They lost five to one. in Buffalo and this game was over early I think it was 2-0-0-0-Buffalo

in the first few minutes 3 minutes into the game 2-0-0-0-1 after the first period 4-1 after the second it was done and afterwards they had a closed-door meeting so you know things aren't going well

with Winnipeg and if you think this is just about Connor Hellebuck missing it's not it's something to do with Connor Hellebuck missing but we've mentioned a few times on this show the Jets underlying numbers have been problematic

all season and they've cratered compared to last year did they win the president's trophy last year they sure did and the national hockey league featuring the MVP and the Vesna winner and in the off season they lose a guy like Nick Eilers

and they bring in Jonathan Taves They've got some other veterans like Tanner Pearson and Gustav Nyquist And it has not worked for the Jets And I just wonder if they're going to be able to get out of this Because if this was just You know, wow, we don't have Hella Buck And our goaltending hasn't been very good

You should be like, well, whatever But even when they started the season I think they started the season something like 9 and 3 Yeah, they were fantastic to start the year But again, their underlying no numbers weren't. And I think they were on a bit of a PDO bender. And now you can see things are, this is a collapse in Winnipeg now. Things are falling apart. And the closed door meeting says something because, you know, normally when you're in Buffalo, you don't want to extend your time

there. You don't want to get out of there. You don't want to be like, we're going to have a closed door meeting. We're going to spend even more time where we're going to yell at each other in Buffalo. You have that meeting on the plane or at the very least the hotel. You're like, get the hell out of there first. Here's some audio from Jets head coach Scott Arneill following a drubbing at the hands of the basement dwelling Buffalo Sabres yesterday. 5-1 loss

back and forth with the reporter where Arneal confirms the players only closed door meeting and also says it was an embarrassing effort from their veteran group. Here's Scott Arneill head coach of the Winnipeg Jets. Couldn't help but notice it took a long time for the room to open, not asking for any

trade secrets, but they had their own right. They had their own team. That's a player initiative. So that was law, yeah. Over your career, what can something like that do? And how often does that happen? Is it fairly rare? Yeah, I think so.

I mean, sometimes it happens and you don't know it. Maybe it's after I speak to them. But tonight, that was them. That was loud taking it. So you're hoping that the response into our next game is a lot better than what it was tonight. You know, we're a veteran group. recognize we just embarrassed ourselves and we're going to have to be heck of a lot better

and excellent. I'm sure everything's in play here. We'll see where we are. We'll check with our injured guys. Obviously, we're going to look at this and we'll make a decision for once in. So five wins in 14 games for the reigning president's trophy team. You think it might have a little bit more to do with Hellebuck than Brough suggests. They're one in five over the last six and the goal scoring is dried up. But in that stretch, if they have Hellebuck, he posts a shut. out in one of those games.

He just wins them a game. And they're two and four. And we're going, oh, well, that's the lowest point. The Jets are going to get this season. And then they're going to move on and be fine again. Is it not the reason why they're in this stretch? Because they're MVP, the Vesna winner is out of the lineup. I feel like that's the clear reason they're one in five.

I reached out to Murat Attesh, who's the beat writer for the Jets with the athletic. And I just texted him. I was like, hey, man, what's up with the Jets? And he said, great question. Their underlying numbers were pretty bad, even when they were 9-3-0. They've probably improved since then, since certain guys got healthy. But this last week or two, it's been messy. They've lost while playing well, lost while playing poorly,

and then tonight looks just awful. It was bad last night. It was really bad last night. And, I mean, it's not surprising that with things cratering. I think now I haven't paid enough attention to all 32 teams yet, But that might be the first player It was the only meeting of the year I haven't heard of another one

You'd think it seemed like I don't know Vancouver Nashville They might have had one by now Maybe Calgary And another thing Lattie The Jets underlying numbers last year were good And you lose a player like Eilers And you don't replace them well

You know I think When Jonathan Taves signed with them We were all happy for Taves Yep But we were also wondering What kind of role are you expecting this guy to play? They're a little, they're too top heavy right now. Like the scoring is Shifley Connor Valardi and then it just kind of falls off a map.

Nieder writer's okay, but I mean, he is sort of is what he is at this stage of his career. I'm going to be fascinated to watch them because they're in a division now where they're like miles off the pace. Yeah. We mentioned Colorado, obviously. We mentioned Dallas, the top two teams in the national hockey. Like they, you can't write them off entirely right now, but they're in a position where they're like, if they turn it around, their wild card bound potentially. And if they don't make the playoffs,

that would be a huge step backwards for a team that had so much success last year. You mentioned Colorado and Dallas. Minnesota's been great lately. Minnesota's like, in the last 10, get a load of this. This is the top three teams in the central. Last 10th, Colorado is 9-0-1.

It's a Canucks opponent tonight. Dallas is 8-1-1, and the wild are 8-0-2. And that wild run is largely based on some improved goaltending as well, right? Isn't Wollstett now carrying the load for them? Yeah, he's very good. He's going to be something special.

Okay. On the subject of goaltending. Speaking of goaltending. Let's turn our attention to the bad goaltending now. You heard this clip in our intro. We'll play it a longer version in a moment here. But last night, Jordan Bittington's night did not last very long. The Blues goalie was pulled after allowing two goals in 10 minutes against the Anaheim Ducks

in an eventual loss to the Anaheim Ducks. It wasn't just that he allowed two on 10. It was that the two goals, they had the stink lines coming off them and everything. And there was this great shot of the Blues broadcast of Jim Montgomery looking up at the board watching the replay after the second goal. And he was like, that's not good.

That's not good at all. It was by Canucks Target, Pavel Minchikov. Was that who it was? Yeah, okay, nice. He scored the second goal. He broke Bennington, although some would say he was already broken. Anyway, there's another great shot from the Blues cameraman catching Bennington going off the ice after getting pulled

and jawing. with Jim Montgomery. So everyone thought, well, we got to ask Monty about this in the post game. Here's what Jim Montgomery had to say about the incident with Jordan Binnington after pulling him in an eventual loss to the Anaheim Ducks last night. Here's Jim Montgomery. Goleys, when you get pulled over the years, what did you make? You know, I love Jordan Bennington.

He's a competitor. He raises his games in the big moments all the time. I love him. You know, he walked off the ice. He said, I love you. I said, I love you too. And we're both competitors by nature. And at the end of the period, he waited for me.

We apologize. We moved on. It's over and done with. I bet it's not over and done. You know what? I bet they didn't say I love you. I bet it was something you. But I don't think it was, I love you.

He was trying to put that to bet. So I watched the rest of the presser as well. And he had a little longer spiel. Montgomery did about dealing with conflict. And he's like, you have to deal with it in the moment. And then you move on. He was flustered, though. Yeah, well, I don't think that, like Jason said, the back and forth was, I love you, man.

No, I love you, man. I think it was a lot different than that. But he put a nice shiny bow on it so that they could, again, try and move on. Here's the thing. Bennington has an 882 save percentage. That's 43rd among qualified NHL goalies right now. He's 6'5 and 5. I've lost count of the amount of times that he has had to pull Bennington in favor of

in favor of Hofer. And the big question, Jason, of course, is Canada really going to take Jordan Bennington to the Olympics? I know we've had this conversation a million times, but it feels like every passing day he gets a little bit worse and he gets a little bit older. He's 32 years old. And I'm not sure.

He aged 10 years since the Four Nations. Seriously, man. I'm trying to think of a guy whose game has gone in a more south direction. Well, you've also got Doug Armstrong, who's in charge of all this. So it's a great philosophical debate, though. I mean, right now, the best goalie, Lattie, feel free to chime in here for Canada is Logan Thompson, right? Yeah, I agree. So he's the guy.

So do you take Logan Thompson, but do you still have Bennington there? And then you take one more? because typically at the Olympics you're taking three goals you're not playing all three if you play two you've kind of you're like you might play two in the round

Robin when one of the games is against like Latvia or something right you might give them a rest yeah sure but is the you know every time that Elliot Friedman talks about it and I trust Elliot he's like

yeah Bennington's going to be on the team he pretty much calls him a lock like he's going to be on the team but Okay, okay. So how does that dynamic work when you get to Italy and he's on the team? Does he get, because of four nations, does he get the first shot? Is it his to lose? And we've seen that happen.

We've seen goalies for Canada lose the job. That's how Longo ended up as the goalie in 2010. I think that would be foolish. To what? To just run Biddington out there with the season he's having. I think that makes him out of the Olympics. Here's how I look at it. Rob's right.

Freed just said on a number of occasions that he's going to go. So let's base this on he's going. At this stage, you have two different scenarios that can play out. One, you start him. And you're like, you go with the Jim Montgomery explanation. He's a battler. He's a game where he's shown up for us before we trust him. The second option is you sit him as the backup.

Now, if you do that, you're essentially saying, hey and let's say it's Logan Thompson for argument sake hey Logan Thompson you're in and you have the shortest leash because the moment that something falters for you like everyone's probably going to be clamoring for the backup like they always do and it's going to be everyone's waiting for Binnington the guy that won us

the four nations to come and take the job so in that sense you're asking are you even really giving him a bona fide shot at the starter's job I think who who Binnington or Thompson Thompson yeah he would have to be rock solid lights out the whole tournament And he might be able to do it.

He's been great this season, right? But the first falter, and we've seen it at tournaments before. I mean, God, we saw it from Biddington in the round-robin' phase of the four nations. People were worried about his shaky play. But he pulled it together in the gold medal. Edog was worried the whole tournament. Yeah, I was with him. Even when he started playing, like, amazing.

At the end, I'm like, something's still going to go wrong. It doesn't inspire confidence, having Biddington in the net. I don't know. Well, does anyone inspire confidence right now? I was just thinking that, like, Thompson and Blackwood would be my one and two with Kemper as the third. Yeah. To me, that would be the safe. The thing that

I know some guys Some of the veteran players Will still make it on the team Regardless of how they're playing exactly I mean did Braden Point already get named to the team Believe he was one of the chorus I think he's so like he's not having a great season But wasn't the message from

The management like it matters In form matters Yeah you need to be in form But they said that for the Four Nations, too. And then they just kind of went with the guys that they went with. There's the inherent trust factor. It's like, are we going to take into consideration the first three months of a condensed season where nobody's been great and parity has ruled the league?

Are we going to go with guys? And they're always going to fall back on two things. What have you done for us internationally in the past, especially the Four Nations? Then what have you done in the Stanley Cup playoffs? Which is why I think, like, Sam Bennett's going to be on that team. Yeah. There's a few people texting in with some decent points, I think. the three-putt Shane says, I may be crazy,

but Team Canada's defense may be better than St. Louis's. Stephen Langley, Binnington had a sub-900 save percentage going into four nations, and he played Lights Out. He's a gamer, and I think he will start Thompson as the backup. Steve is a good safe option. Bennington was not Lights Out in the tournament. Bennington was Lights Out in the final. I thought he was pretty good in the tournament.

I disagree with that. I think he was, I wouldn't, maybe wouldn't say Lights Out, I thought he was good. I thought he made some pretty good saves along the way. And I wasn't as worried as you guys were about the goaltending. But I'm... 907 and four games at the Four Nations. He got better as a tournament, and he was huge in the final.

9.07 and four games in the tournament. I'd say solid is how I would describe it. Yeah, he was fine, solid. I wouldn't say he was amazing, but he also didn't have to be. He was fantastic in the fine. Yeah, when he had to be amazing, that's when he turned it out. And that's exactly what he did when they won a Stanley Cup. And again, those are going to be.

big deciding factors for hockey Canada, I think. This decision is going to be fascinating. I'm still not convinced Badaard's going to be on this team. He's got to be. I don't know. Celebrini and Baderd have to be on it. I'm still not convinced, bud. I'm still not convinced.

I think that they're not convinced that they should be on there. If they're still on a team will be on it. I think he should. I think it should be a progressive approach. If he's still at this points percentage, like by the time they get to like the selection, he'll be named. There's no way they wouldn't.

He's like, what, is third in the league and score? Breff and I are, in addition to the Canadian men's national soccer team, we're big supporters of England. And during the Garris Southgate era, which had great success. They fell short of winning a title, but they had great success.

They won a lot more matches than they lost. There would always be the young upstart and the young hot shot that was trying to push their way into the national team, and more often than not, he would go with the guys that he trusted. Yeah. Because it was just... Especially like on the back line, the young guys would never get in there.

Because it's a short tournament and you can try and expect the unexpected and prep for what might happen. But the reality of it was most times, you just go with the guys that you inherently trust. Harry McGuire's in there. Right. And Jordan Pickford was always the goal. I guarantee you, this is what's going to happen, though, if they don't, if like him and celebrating don't make the team and all of a sudden they can't score a goal and like, man, we could use an extra goal or two right about now. Oh, I guess we could have used Badard and Celebrity then. one of them will make it for sure

I would hope at least one make I don't think this is the same thing as the world juniors though the world juniors was different I don't think that after this tournament you know if Canada has trouble scoring with Connor McDavid

Nathan McKinnon Kale McCarr and it's kind of on those guys right like it's not going to be like well they could have used badarders like they had Nathan McKinnon Connor McDavid and Kail McCormickman Four of the top five scores in the league are Canadian.

And you're like, ah, we'll take two of them. What are you thinking? No, you take all four. It's just what we can do. We like to make it. We like to make it as hard as possible. I also, I know we're up against it for time. I also just want to throw out, like, if you're John Cooper,

and you've got a fairly considerable say over who's on the roster and who plays, when you say, are you going to take guys that you don't know all that well in Bedard's celebrating? Man, we suck right now. I'm not taking anyone from Tampa. Well, but that's what I'm saying. You've been watching Tampa? No, I know they're doing better. But I'm saying in those moments, he's probably going to be like,

I know and trust, Point and Sorrelli more. For his guys. Yeah, and so that could be a deciding factor as well. So, yeah, Greg's right. Bedard defensively is not. He doesn't have to worry about that, though. But Bardard offensively is very good. No, they got like the best defense in the NHL back there.

Just let them do their thing. So Fadar could just hang out on the offensive zone. You're listening to the best of Halford and Brough. You're listening to the best of Halford and Brough. It's his friend and Bachelor, Bachelor, Bachelor, Life from Rogers Arena, Collinca, Knox Games. It is Brendan Bachelor, Bachelor, Bachelor. 703 on a Tuesday.

Happy Tuesday, everybody, Halford Bruff, Sportsnet, 650. Halford Brub for the morning is brought you by Sands and Associates. learn how a consumer proposal could get you on the road to being debt-free in just two weeks. Visit them online at sands dash trustee.com. We are now in hour two of the program. Brendan Batchelor, play-by-play voice of the Vancouver Canucks is going to join us in just a moment here to kick off hour two.

Hour two of this program is brought to by Jason Homonuck at Jason Dow Mortgage. If you love giving the banks more of your money, then don't let Jason shop around to find the perfect mortgage for you. Visit them online at jason.morgage. We're coming to you live from the Kintech Studio. Now is the time to maximize the benefits of, custom orthotics before the year runs out, visit kintech.net. To the phone lines we go, our next guest is on the call tonight.

6 o'clock. Note the start time. Game will be in ball arena in Denver. It's the abs. It's the Canucks. Canucks play-by-play man. Brendan Batchler here on the Halford & Brough Show on SportsNet 650. Morning, Batch, how are you? I'm doing well. How are you guys? We are well. We are anticipating. I don't know if eagerly is the word because this is a difficult foe that the Vancouver

Canucks have tonight. the Colorado Avalanche are 10, oh, and two at home this year. Collectively on the year, home and away, they've suffered just one regulation loss. In a league that's been sort of earmarked by parity over the first few months of the season, I think it's fair to say I agree or disagree that the abs are maybe the one true great team, or at least with the possibility to be great in the early stages of this season. Yeah, absolutely. They're a wagon, as they say, in terms of, you know,

one regulation loss and we're in December now, like, and this is a season with a, you know, compressed schedule because of the Olympics, that's, uh, that's very impressive stuff. And, uh, yeah, they're going to be a tough out for the Canucks tonight. Uh, but at the same time, that's why they play the game. So I guess we'll see how things go. But yeah, anytime, um, you know, you get a chance to watch Nathan McKinn and Kail McCar and, um, you know, the, the gang down there in Colorado, they, uh, they're an impressive team to watch. And, you know, I'm sure we'll see something exciting on the ice tonight either way what do you make of the Canucks power play right now

yeah well obviously there are some moving parts that have been some moving parts due to injuries you know not having Garland the last game and we saw Leckermackie there on the power play later in the game after Sherwood had been given a chance it had been going very well and you know this is something whenever we ask

Quinn Hughes about the power play he sort of defaults to yeah it's a long season and the power play is going to have a hot stretch and then a cold stretch and it's going to go back and forth. It's not always going to be clicking at the way you want it. But, you know, they went eight straight games scoring on the power play, which I believe is tied for the most consecutive games scoring on the power play of any team in the league this year or it's thereabouts. So it's one of the hottest stretches we've seen this power play go on. Of course, they then end that run by going 0 for 7 on the power play.

and, you know, there may be some cracks showing there. I think some frustration in terms of when it's not able to make a difference for them, how much they would really like it to. And so, you know, I think some of that body language stuff that we've talked about over the last few days has showed through more on the power play than anywhere else. But, you know, they have the ability to be a top-producing power play in this league. We've seen them do it. We saw them do it over an eight-game stretch.

catch. It just does seem to go hot and cold sometimes, and right now it's running a little colder than they would like over the last couple of games. And if they want to beat the Colorado Avalanche tonight, it would certainly help if they get power plays, if they can produce on them. Yeah, the Aves have very good penalty killing, but believe it or not, not a very good power play themselves this year. But I think they've got the potential to score. Batch, when you've, I mean, it is true. I think the Canucks came in on a, they went into San Jose, having scored on the power play eight or nine straight games.

So the power play was producing, what is the bread and butter of the Canucks power play? We always think about, you know, if it's Ovechkin on the power play, him teeing it up from that spot or dry-siddle, you know, practically

down by the goal line, taking passes from McDavid and one-timing them home. Do the Canucks have a bread-and-butter play? Yeah, that's interesting. If I had to pick one, I would say like the high slot shot tip, where, you know, it's sometimes Besser that's there with his stick

and someone will get a shot through looking for a tip from the high slot and they're hoping it either goes in or they can create a rebound. And they have scored a lot of goals at and around the net front this year on the power play. Jake DeBrusk meets the team in power play goals. So, you know, I would say when it's going well, they're more effective at getting it to the net and creating some of those chances. And this is going to make me sound like Rick Talkett

because he always talked about attacking the net and getting pucks there or creating odd man situations and guys having to go to the net to create those chances. And it seems like when it's going, a lot of that stuff happens. And when it's not, it gets very perimeter and very, I don't know what they're right. We're mechanical maybe in terms of predictable,

but the wrong kind of predictable in terms of just moving the puck around the outside, deferring, deferring, deferring, and not getting the puck to the net. And ultimately, they kill their own penalties when they do that. And so I can understand why there might be some frustration from a guy

like Queen Hughes if he's passing the puck off, whether it's to Elias Pedersen or anyone else on the power play, and you pass it off to someone that you thinks in a shooting position and they dust it off and they take a look and they dust it off and they don't like it and they give it back to you. And suddenly, you're killing off your own power play by not being decisive and not getting the puck to the net

and not even making the penalty kill defend you other than you know moving around into their positions to take away shooting waves so you know i can totally understand where the frustration comes from when it's not going well and it seems like you know much like other areas of this team's game when they struggle when they simplify things when they get pucks and bodies to the net that's when they have the most success and you know that's where they've scored most of their goals with Jake Debrusk at the net front this year

but you know I know what you mean about like the Leon Drysidal goal at the bottom of that right circle is a hallmark the Ovechka goal at the top of the left circle is a hallmark the conducts don't really have a noted dangerous weapon hallmark on their

power play that other teams have to account for and as a result that probably makes them easier to defend I like that phrase, dust it off. Do you use that on the broadcast? You should. Describing the Canucks power play is like he dusts it off, gives it back to Quinn. Quinn skates around, gives it back to him, dusts it off, back to Quinn.

And then Quinn eventually skates around and just gets frustrated and shoots the puck. That's kind of like the Canucks Power Play when it's not really clicking. Do you think Brock Besser thought that he would be on a second line with David Kamp and Kiefer Sherwood? Probably not, but, you know, such has been the way of the world with the injuries this year at times that, and especially down the middle, that, no, I absolutely think that Brock Besser thought he might be playing with Elias Patterson or Philip Heedle up the lineup, and things would be going a whole lot better, but ultimately they are where they are, and you've got to make do with what you've got. But, yeah, Garland being out is just add another to the list. And, you know, obviously they've been more healthy on the wings than they have been down the middle, although they still haven't had Neal's Hoaglander in a game. So hopefully he's able to return sooner rather than later here.

I think they had initially projected eight to ten weeks for Hoaglander, and 10 weeks is December 8th. So we're talking about, you know, hopefully in a week from now if things go well, that you could be looking at him back in the lineup because they had said that it would be closer. to the 10-week mark, you know, about a month ago maybe. So that might add some winger depth. That brings a guy back into the lineup that can fill a top six role if Garland's going to miss any sort of time here.

So, you know, maybe that would help. But yeah, it's, you know, tough sledding for some of those guys in terms of where they thought they might be playing and who they thought they might be playing with and ultimately how that's played out. And, you know, that's just the way it's gone this year with some of the injuries and yeah you know if you had told me going into the season that David Camp would be their second light center in early December I would have gone like

isn't he on Toronto yeah I would have go oh that's not good so unfortunately that's where we said it's not good but they've got to try and make the best of it do I think Besser has been pretty good all things considered yeah I think he as well has sort of good stretches and bad stretches and there have been a couple times this year where he's gone a little bit quiet but certainly of late he's he's been around the puck more he's created some more chances and maybe they haven't been going in for him with the regularity that he would like but he is a guy that i think is making the best of this situation with what he's got and um so obviously you know when the power play's going that helps him because he's going to be involved in that

sort of production. So, you know, that will dictate a lot of how he's producing. But this is a team that needs to score more at five-on-five. And so you look at a guy like Brock Besser and you say, okay, that's a guy that we need to get going here that needs to produce for us, that needs to help us. When we create some of those opportunities at five-on-five, and, you know, driving play is sometimes a challenge for this team. But when they get those looks, they need to be a little bit more opportunistic.

And Brock Besser, at his best, is an opportunistic shooter. Are you looking forward to watching Colorado tonight? Oh, yeah, absolutely. I think I maybe look forward to watching Nathan McKinnon more than any other player in the league. And maybe that's just because we see the Oilers so much because they're a divisional opponent that, you know, I'm not to say that McDavid is like old hat and you don't look forward to watching McDavid play. But we've seen a lot of Connor McDavid over the last few years. You don't see quite as much of Nathan McKinnon.

and he's just such an impressive, powerful player. You know, there are only a few guys in the league, and you know, you guys will remember this, maybe not all of our listeners will. But do you remember when Pavel Beret was on the Canucks and he'd pick up the pocket of his own blue line and you hear the crowd go, whoa, like you do something was about to happen? There's only a couple guys in the league that have that,

and Nathan McKinnon's one of them, Carter McDavid's another one, certainly. And so, you know, he's always a lot of fun to watch. Unfortunately, for Canucks fans, it's usually for the wrong reasons for Vancouver. This is kind of, this might seem like it's coming out of the blue here, but it's not. Because we were talking earlier about all the firepower that Team Canada has with the likes of Nathan McKinnon and Connor McDavid and Kel McCar on the back end. Like Sidney Crosby, have you seen him what he's doing? He's scoring, he's like among the leaders in goal scoring.

do you think Badard's going to make Team Canada No, I don't To be perfectly honest And you know The interesting thing And I actually a couple weeks ago Sat down and tried to go through

The exercise of naming a team Canada Because there actually is a little more wiggle room They get to take a 25 man roster I believe to the Olympics So you know You could take the whole four nations roster And then add two more guys

And it's still impossible especially with the forward group. So you look at because you have to take three goaltenders, so you're going to take 22 skaters, and then it comes down to, you know, are you taking 14 forwards and eight defensemen or 13 forwards and nine defensemen? And I would lean towards nine defensemen

just because, you know, a couple of injuries on the blue line could really cost you, and we saw how they had to, you know, bring Thomas Harley in to that Four Nations team. And with John Cooper coaching, he seems pretty comfortable going with 11 forwards and seven defensemen. If he has to, he's done it a lot in the past, even in the playoffs with the lightning. So I would be more worried about losing guys on the back end than losing guys up front. So if you're going to go with nine defensemen to have that insulation, then there's

less wiggle room in the forward group with 13 guys. And maybe they ultimately take 14. That was just the way I was looking at it. But either way, you're not taking more than 14 forwards, I wouldn't imagine. And so then you have to look back at the roster from the Four Nations team and who's coming off that. And, you know, that's a hard decision. You know, maybe Travis Connectney doesn't go. You know, you could see another thing with this season and all the injuries is you have no idea who's going to be healthy by the time you're getting to the Olympics. Yeah, Mark Stone, you never know with him. Yeah, exactly. But also Mark Stone is kind of a guy that has to be on that team if he's healthy, I think, just based on the way that he's produced. Houston and how important he's been. So, you know, then you get actually into the weeds of naming a team. And if you want to put guys like Nick Suzuki or Mark Schifley on the team, then you can't also have guys like Connor Bedard and Macklin Celebrini on the team. And I think Celebrini probably has the edge on Bard right now.

So, you know, ultimately we'll see what philosophy they take, you know, because it's the Olympics and the officiating standard is going to be. different than the Four Nations face off, you know, a guy like Tom Wilson, can you afford to take him if he's going to lay a big hit? And we know that in international hockey, sometimes you can just for laying a big hit even, right? Like the standard is so much less than it is in the NHL for that sort of stuff. So can you afford to take him? What about Suzuki? What about Shifley? What about Godard? What about Celebrini? It's almost impossible to pick a roster out of these guys. And so for me, you know, especially now that we are expecting to have a regular

calendar of international hockey, I can look at Connor Bedard and say, you're having a great year, you've just missed out this year, but we've got you earmarked for the World Cup in a couple of years. And it's not like if he doesn't make this team, it's going to be a long stretch where he doesn't play for Team Canada because some of the guys that, you know, I would put on the team right now, like Mark Stone, like Sidney Crosby, who are, you know, in the twilight of their careers, may not be there in a couple of years from now. And that's when some of those opportunities open up for some of the young guys to come in and to see that changing of the guard with Team Canada. It's going to be fascinating. Oh, what is your wish for the World Cup draw?

Because that's on Friday. Who do you want for Vancouver? Because it can't be England. Scotland. That would be awesome, eh? Yeah, awesome. Absolutely. If the Tartan Army comes here? impressively well. Yeah. And I saw, I think they would, they would love to come to this part of the world. A lot of the Scottish fans would.

So I think we'd have a ton of Scots in Vancouver if they were drawn here. And they're a really likable team too. So if they came and played Canada in a game or played any sort of game here, I think it would be really cool. And we could probably beat them. Yeah, maybe. Who knows? Bob McTominate was nominated for the Ballandor,

so you never know. He could come in and pick Canada apart. They do have a ton of really good individual players. I often said, like, they should, now they're kind of reaching where they should have been. Yeah. Like, they should have been better internationally than they have been over the last little bit because they've got really good players scattered throughout Europe. They're just really underperforming.

I just really want Canada to get out of the group. Yeah, likewise. I mean, it goes without saying, right? Yeah. But I think getting one of those big, significant, well-traveled groups of fans in Vancouver would be amazing. It would only, I mean, the atmosphere is going to be. going to be great regardless, but I think getting, like, the tartan army coming would be fantastic.

I'd be all for it as well. Anyway, Batch, we're up against it for time. Thanks for doing this today. We appreciate it. Have a good call tonight. We'll do this again next week. Sounds good, boys. Thank you. Thank you. That's Brendan Batchelor, play-by-play voice of the Vancouver Canucks here on the Halford & Brough show on Sportsnet, 650. The debate around the Olympic team is going to be intense when Batch said he'd have Mark Stone on the team, a bunch of people texted in and

disagreed with him. Keith the Water guy. Mark Stone is one sneeze away from six months on the IR. Other people, I would take Celebrini and Bedard over Stone and Marner. I don't think Hockey Canada is

going to see it the same way. There's two... Look, look, look, look. Oh, you're dropping a look. I'll stop. Many of them. There's two conversations here that you need have who do you think should be on the team and who do you think hockey Canada will put on the team and those are two very different things well do you disagree generally with like a lot of the

things that hockey Canada does I'm not saying that I'm saying would you have celebrini and badard on the team because I don't know if I would I think I'd probably have celebrini but I don't know about badard because I don't know if I'm getting he's going to get the opportunities that he normally would with the black hawks where he's the number one power play guy he's getting the offensive opportunities. Maybe I have them on there as an extra forward just in case, but I don't trust him defensively. I don't think any.

I don't think that when it comes to the quality and caliber of players that you're talking about, I think that you don't necessarily have to do the A-Dog approach, which is look at the top five scores in the NHL. They all deserve to be there because they're all playing great. Everyone knows that you're not building a video game lineup here. here. You need certain guys to fill certain roles to accomplish certain things. So in the case of Stone, for all of these people saying that he's a 10 man and he looks awful out there, in the nine games he played this year, he had 16 points. Yeah, he's a very, very good player. Now,

health is a totally separate conversation. He can't go. Yeah. He can't go and you don't run the risk of taking him. Although with an expanded roster, you could probably take a little bit of a risk with a guy who's 50-50 health-wise. Well, it's also he's going to be even smaller ice. in Italy, so Mark Stone Skating doesn't matter as much. Now, to counter my own argument here about maybe you leave Bedard and Celebrini on the outside looking in, I remember the 06 Olympics and a lot of that selection committee predicated their choices on what we're talking about. Who do we trust? Who's been here in the past?

Who are the veterans that we know or we think we know are going to be able to get the job? done here. And they went conservative instead of bold, they went old instead of young and it cost them. It looked like a tired older, couldn't get the legs, didn't have the juice kind of line up

and it was a disaster of an Olympics. Also you've got to start somewhere like yeah you've never been there before well yeah because you're young so give them the chance. They got to start. That team though did not have the level of firepower that Canada

has with McDavid and McKinnon. But I think they thought they did. I don't think they did. I think they thought that we could bring the drapers and everybody else because we're so talented offensively. And then they showed up and they were like, oh, wait a minute, we're old. Now, that's almost 20 years ago. I think the thinking has evolved.

I think the selection process has evolved. I don't think that we're relying on guys that have got the job done for you in the past. And by this, we're talking about the very recent past. That four nations tournament should count for something. I'm a firm believer in that, that whatever those guys did in that moment, and you go back to the final game, like Sam Bennett, and you're saying, well, he's off to a pretty lousy start this year. And you're like, well, how much are you going to put stock into October, November, December

hockey, as opposed to what he did in the Stanley Cup, or he won the consummite, and then what he did for you in that tournament. And it wasn't just about the physicality, and he scored a big goal against the U.S. to send that thing to overtime. And he's a guy that I would say, if you're 50-50 on, the deciding factor might be, I trust this guy,

because he's done it before. Now, that logic applies to everyone except Jordan Bennington. You know who should ask about 2006? Adam Foote. He was on that team. He was on that team.

Yeah. I wonder what his memories would be about that. Probably not great. Yeah. Like, that was a disappointing team. I don't really remember that tournament. I do because it was such a disappointment. Yeah.

And it was on like after O2 and Salt Lake where everything was, like it couldn't have been better, right? And I think everyone naturally assumed that the hockey internationally had course corrected and like Canada was just going to be fine now. They'd figured it out in O2 and it was just going to be great moving forward. But it wasn't. Spoiler alert, if you're going to go back and watch it. It wasn't.

It was good for the Siddines. It was good for the Sedeans actually. And Peter Ford. I almost called him Philip Forsberg. Peter Forsberg. You're listening to the best of Halford and Brough.