Halford & Brough in the Morning - The Best Of Halford And Brough 1/27/25

Episode Date: January 27, 2025

Mike & Jason look back at a busy weekend in sports including a big 'Nucks win over the Caps and the Super Bowl matchups being set, plus they preview tonight's Canucks road tilt in St. Louis with NHL.com & In Goal Magazine's Kevin Woodley. 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. Whoa. Wait a minute. Huh? Hold up. What? Oh, okay. Did we just lose the f***ing Canucks? Da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da You're listening to Halford and Brough. Middle of the ice, Hughes with a wrist shot, he scores! There's not a lot of big boys like the Caps have some big boys up front. This is the big but. At the end of the day, you choose your hard. And right now, we're not choosing the right hard. You have to embrace the hardness.

Oh I'm hard! It's a game of 18 yards! I poured water on my head! And the Kansas City Chiefs are gonna pull this off! Good morning Vancouver 601 on a Monday. Happy Monday everybody. This is Alfred at his brow, fitted Sportsnet 650.

We are coming to you live from the Kintec Studios in beautiful Fairview Slopes in Vancouver. Jason, good morning. Good morning. Adog, good morning to you. Good morning. Laddie, good morning to you. Hello, hello. And intern Ryan, welcome to the show and good morning to you as well. Good morning. You did it. Perfect. Alfred and Bradford in the morning is brought to you by Vancouver Honda, Vancouver's premier destination for Honda customers. They have a friendly, knowledgeable staff that can help with anything you're looking for. Sales, financing, service, or parts. We are in hour one of the program.

Hour one is brought to you 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 them at 1170 Powell Street in Vancouver. We are coming to you live from the Kintec studio. Kintec footwear and orthotics working together with you and Step. You know what kind of show we have today, Jason? Big-ish. It's a big show.

It's a big show. It's pretty big. It's pretty big. We got actually, it's actually overloaded. It's too crowded. There's too much going on the show today. Four guests, Kinox game day, two giveaways, countless reads.

We got a lot to get into. The show begins at 6.30 this morning. Nick Shook from NFL.com is gonna join us folks. The Super Bowl is set. It's the Kansas City Chiefs and the Philadelphia Eagles. They will meet for the second time in three years, two weeks from now. The Chiefs are looking to become the first team

in NFL history to win three consecutive Super Bowls. I also wanna ask Nick about the Seahawks. They have hired a new offensive coordinator, Clint Kubiak, formerly of the Saints. That's going to be all at 6 37 o'clock. Thomas Hickey, former NHL defenseman, now NHL analyst is going to join the show. He is working the broadcast tonight. Canucks Blues 430 from St. Louis. It's an Amazon game. Thomas Hickey is going to be calling the game for Amazon Prime. Here's what we're going to do as a former player. We're going to ask them about the Canucks current offensive woes, specifically their inability to generate scoring chances from the slot.

Now, as a former defenseman, I bet he loves how much the Canucks funnel things back to the point. Keep doing it guys, keep doing that. He's like, I personally love the way that they play hockey. So we'll talk to Thomas Dickey about that. Uh, we'll also look ahead to the game tonight. 7.30 Kevin Woodley, nhl.com in goal magazine. I joked on Twitter on Saturday night that we

officially begin the goalie controversy and debate today. I don't think it's a joke. I wasn't even joking because Woodley is on the show and we need to talk about this. So who goes tonight at St. Louis? Is it Demko or is it Lankton?

Who goes for the rest of this road trip? Do you remember just like a week ago? Yeah, we got to get Demer a run of games. That was last week. Do we? Hold up. A lot has changed since then. So we'll talk to Kevin Woodley at 7.30

about all the goaltending issues for this team. Eight o'clock, Andy Strickland's gonna join the program. Blues, Rinkside reporter for the FanDuel Sports Network. We of course will preview tonight's opponent, the St. Louis Blues. The game is in St. Louis tonight. Quickly, I will let you know that because it's an early game, we have a crazy lineup of consecutive Canucks shows today

on Sportsnet 650. Canucks talk goes from 12net 650. Canucks talk goes from 12 to 2. Canucks Central in the pregame show picks up right after that and goes all the way through to 430, which is when puck drop will happen. Batch and Randy will be on the call right at 430. And then after the game, the post game show runs all the way through to nine o'clock. So we've got about nine hours of consecutive Canucks coverage around the Blues and the Canucks game. And a reminder, if you don't have Amazon Prime, you can hear everything all right here on Sportsnet 650.

We're also giving away, we've got a lot to get into here, we're giving away another pair of 9-inch nails tickets. Now let's work through this. Caller number 9 at 8 o'clock this morning, 8 o'clock, 8-0-0. Caller number 9 is going gonna wear a pair of tickets to see Nine Inch Nails this summer. The show is in August. It's at Rogers Arena. Phone number here, 604-280-650.

That number again, 604-280-650. We are also giving away a pair of tickets and a $50 gift card to the Clayton Public House for the big football game on Sunday, February the ninthth. That's going to be a call at eight 15. Yes. That's also going to be caller number nine. No. Yes. Really? Yeah. You're you're calling her last minute. Yeah. I'm going to, yeah. Call her nine. Just going to make it easy. Call her and across the board. All right. That number again, six Oh four two eight Oh zero six 50. Uh,

we got to tell her the planning down the drain, just because of Mike Haliford. Just like that, poof, gone. And just like that, pow. And the planning was we were gonna take caller eight. Yeah. But instead. Let's make it more confusing. Ah!

So, working in reverse on the guest list, eight o'clock Andy Strickland, seven thirty Kevin Woodley, seven o'clock Thomas Hickey, six thirty Nick Schuch. That's what's happening on the program today. Laddie, tell everybody what happened. Hey, did you guys see the program today laddie tell everybody what happened

Hey, did you guys see the game last night? What happened is brought to you by the BC construction safety alliance making safety simpler by giving construction companies the best in tools or resources And safety training visit them online at bccsa.ca Quinn Hughes scored twice and the Vancouver Canucks beat NHL leading Washington Capitals 2-1 on Saturday night at Rogers Arena In doing so the Canucks took care of a pretty vaunted opponent, capped 6 game win streak gone. Alex Ovechkin still 20 goals shy, breaking Wayne Gretzky's record and another fantastic performance for Quinn Hughes as he goes further and further up the rankings for the heart trophy for MVP. I'm not sure how much more praise we can heap on

the captain's shoulders, but he deserves everything he's getting, except maybe the team around him. This quote made me sad for him. Ian McIntyre got this quote from Quinn Hughes after the game on Saturday. And Quinn said, I feel responsible that we've had the turmoil that we've had.

It's not your fault. And I want to be the reason that we can get out of this and be successful. It's embarrassing to lose some of the games we've lost the last couple of weeks. It's not your fault. It's not your fault. Give him a hug. It's not your fault.

Do you remember last week we were talking about how if we were Quinn Hughes, we would be furious at our teammates for everything that's going on. Do you think it's a little embarrassing that, um, Quinn Hughes has 54 points and the next highest point getter on the Canucks has 33. It's wait, so he's, so he's a defenseman. Remember? Yes.

Now I'm aware. And he has 21 points more than the next guy on his team, which is JT Miller who has played six fewer games than Quinn Hughes, but 33 points to 54, and then you go down to Besser with 32 points, Garland with 31, Pedersen with 30 points. It's great for his MVP candidacy. However, it's bad for the hockey team, I would say. There should not be that great a disparity in your first point getter and your second point getter, especially when your first point

getter and your leader is a defenseman. Like it's a wild stat. I didn't realize until you put it in the notes to be dead honest. I knew he was leading. I didn't realize it was such a big gap. What do you think about the notion that he feels responsible for some of the turmoil

that they've had because he is the captain of the team and, um, you know, there is a responsibility on paper that the captain sorts this stuff out. I think he feels responsible for everything with this team. Like I have to do the majority of the defensive work. I have to do the offensive work. I got to take care of the dressing room. That's all messed up.

He probably has to do some of the laundry from time to time. I just, I just pictured him cleaning the toilet. Yeah, but in the dressing room He's just vacuuming after postgame. Yeah, he's in there. You know who destroyed this toilet I have to do everything around here and I have laundry he hands out the hotel keys when they get to the lobbies like Here's your don't lose this they hardly lose it 10 seconds This is your third key. I didn't get a key. You did get a key. I just gave it to you. It's hanging around your neck.

Oh yeah. He has to call everyone and remind them when the meetings start. He's got a lot on his shoulders for just a tiny little guy, but he is responsible for an awful lot on this team. So that first goal that he scored, obviously a very nice goal, an incredible backhand,

penetrated the middle of the ice.hand penetrated the middle of the ice. He got to the middle of the ice and that was a big theme after the game from Rick Tauket. And I actually went to this game, my first game in the press box had Saturday free. And I went and I went to the game specifically with this question in mind. And I was going to go down and ask Rick, talking about it.

Why can't the Canucks generate more scoring chances from the slot? Now, I imagine that as soon as I showed up, they would get like 30 slot scoring chances. I'd be like, okay, well, this is typical sad club commish stuff. But the game delivered. Uh, the Canucks only two goals were scored by Hughes while the forwards barely generated any chances. And talk, it talked a lot after the game about the Canucks inability to get to the inside of the ice.

And that was before I specifically asked about it. Um, I want to play the questions that I asked him and his answers, but just so you know, he already talked a lot about it. And it was me kind of like revisiting it because on our show, we've had a lot of talk about the constant point shots. And I think it's interesting that a lot of people have texted in and said, that's what Rick Taukett wants. That's what his system calls for.

He's responsible for the way the Canucks are playing. Like that is a big responsibility for him, but that is not what he wants. So getting to the middle of the ice, not everyone skates like Quinn Hughes. They can't create those chances like he did to get to the inside. There's not a lot of big boys like the Caps have some big boys up front that can take the puck to the net and no one can really do anything about it. What's the answer for your group? Well, you can use your quickness and you've got to remember when you do take the interior,

they play man on man, right? So usually you have man on man, the guy's behind you, so you've got to have the patience to be able to have a guy on your back and take it to the interior. So I think you can use your quickness. You know, you have to have, you know, listen, let's face it, you have to have some courage too to get in the interior, but I think you can use your quickness. And you've got to, I remember I used to talk to Sidney Crosby about this you know his heart rate was always the same you know if a guy was on his back

or wherever it's you don't panic the guys on your back that we talked about that all the time so to answer your question don't be afraid when somebody's got it take it to the interior and then make a play do you feel like there's too much deferring to the point man? A million percent. It's been a struggle all year trying to, I shouldn't say a struggle, it's something that we've talked about. And we'll have a game

where you'll go, wow, we did it. And then it's the sustainability is what we're having a tough time with. Hopefully a game like this, quitting getting a goal, you can build off that. Practice it more when we practice. We actually talked about that tweaking our practices where we, instead of having three or four points, just basically do a lot of interior offensive stuff just for half hour. Don't even worry about defense. I think we have to start doing that more.

So tweaking our practice will help. And it's on us coaches to really preach it. So I want to be specific about what I'm talking about here. I'm not talking about rush chances. Everyone's talking about rush chances earlier in the season. I'm not talking about rush chances right now. I'm not talking about going to the net and setting screens or trying to tip pox. That's important, but I'm not talking about that here.

I am talking about the Canucks inability to get set up in the offensive zone and generate clean shots that don't come from the perimeter or from bad angles. That includes, by the way, while they're on the power play. So let's think about this. There are a few ways to get chances in the slot. Can you think of some ways to get some chances in the slot? You can skate into the slot. Yeah, well, Quinn Hughes did that.

Yeah, that's a good way to do it. Okay. What if you, what if you've got some big boys on your team? Then you might have to get the aforementioned courage, maybe be a little physical and, and establish your position in the slot. So you can, you can just use something, just, some of the power for it's just, I get the puck, I'm taking it to the front of that.

A little bit of bump and grind. Don't you think the most effective way would be to pass the puck into the slot and have someone there to take the pass? Mm-hmm. That also feels like a good way to do it. Seems easier, right? No, it should pass it to the point. Let the puck do the work. Right. Which is why Tauke was out there with

Pedersen at practice yesterday, getting him to make plays while feeling pressure on his backside, like Sidney Crosby is so good at. Right? Sidney Crosby, if so, you know, if you're trying to check Sidney Crosby, he'll turn his back to you, but he still is able to skate away from that pressure or turn against

that pressure and make plays. He's not automatically just going to fling the puck away. And I get the sense that a lot of the Canucks are doing that. In fact, it's not even a sense I'm seeing it happen. Here's Rick Tauket talking about the work he was doing with Elias Pedersen yesterday at practice.

Working on skating and getting inside, you know, being able to get people on your back, still have the puck and make a playoff that I think, uh, sometimes when you get it, you defer too much. I think that's just a mental mindset. And I think for him, we're just going to have to spend every day and continue to do that. Um, and string some really good practices for him. And even on a morning skate you can still work on that stuff.

I got some stats for you. Our friend Adam Vingen who used to cover the Nashville, cover Nashville Predators, now does some stats work for sports net. He's got access to the sport logic database. And he sent some of this stuff over to me. The Canucks are 30th out of 32 teams in the percentage of overall shot attempts that come from the slot. They are 27th in completed slot passes, 30th in attempted slot passes. The forward, so you take Quinn Hughes out of this, dead last in slot shots on net per game.

This absolutely matches the eye test. There's nothing I find fishy about those numbers. Anyone who watches the Canucks on a regular basis knows they don't create many slot shots. And that is pretty important because that's where a lot of goals are scored. The forwards will feel pressure and they will fling it back to the point like it's their safety

blanket. So who are the best guys, individuals, who are the best individuals at creating slot shots? What kind of player do you think would be good? On the Canucks? No, no, no. Just like it's, it's typically going to be your centers, right? Yeah, centers.

Cause those are, those, those are your puck distributors for the most part. So in the league, Nathan McKinnon, Kucherov, not a centre, but. McDavid, Marner, not a centre, but still a creative player. Jack Hughes, Jack Eichel, Clayton Keller, Dry Cytl, Crosby, William Nylander. Those are the top 10 players in completing slot passes into the slot. Here's where the Canucks rank. What a surprise, it's a defenseman that leads them.

Quinn Hughes is 36 in the NHL. Now JT Miller, who's a pretty good passer when he's on his game, is 40th. Garland is 87th. Elias Pettersson is 122nd in the NHL. Feels low. At the end of the day, you need your playmakers to make plays when the puck is on their stick.

They're going to feel pressure sometimes, like a quarterback that still makes a throw with the pocket collapsing, or even in the case of the best, you can have a guy hanging off them and they'll still make throws under pressure. So what is the disconnect here? What needs to change? Well I think this is why talk it was asked that question last week about you know is it maybe that when you have a player as singularly talented as an effective as Hughes that maybe some of the players on the ice have an inherent

deferential lean. God, that's a big sentence. But they inherently think like, I should just get this back to him. It's like that joke we say like when Quinn doesn't have the puck, everyone should be asking, when do we get him the puck? Or when he's not on the ice. Now, Taukech shot that down. He's like to me, that's, he actually called it asinine. He's like an asinine way of thinking, you thinking, everyone out here has the ability to make plays. And he always says the same thing. We want our guys to make plays. So it does circle back to the question. It's like, well, if the head coach wants you

to make more plays and be more creative and drive the guts of the ice, the same guts of the ice that he talks so much about defending with your honor and your life, why isn't it happening? Why do you rank so low,, solo in all of the key metrics in that particular area of the ice? And I don't really have a great answer, unfortunately,

and I think the problem is I don't think Taken has a great answer either. There's obviously- Well, he's obviously working on it, right? Yeah, but there's definitely something, the only real one I came up with is that, and I hate hanging this on Pederson, but when your best player and your highest paid forward

and your number one center defers as often and with regularity as Pederson has done this year, I do wonder if everyone else takes a page from that, or it's the, when you mentioned, like look at the other high paid, top flight elite guys in the league, they're doing it with regularity. Your guy is not.

And again, I don't want to pin this on one guy because I think it's a team wide thing. But for Pedersen to be like rank 122nd in the league in some of these metrics, which is what, a consummate with a third line center, or a guy that doesn't, didn't even get the amount of ice time and opportunities, it's a problem. I think some of it is definitely on that. Are they big enough up front? Okay. So the personnel is the other thing that you

have to discuss here. When talking, cause he answered your question with, well, you need to have speed. So the obvious follow up question is like, do you have enough? And then the other one was like, you obviously, and he was like, you know, you got to acknowledge it, you need the courage to go there.

And courage comes in a lot of different forms. Oftentimes it's from the bigger, stronger guys that are maybe not worried about getting hurt or not worried about paying the price in front of the net or in the guts of the ice. Or just the strength to carry the puck in there. So do you have the personnel and the right personnel? Because if you look at the team,

there are some guys that have particular characteristic and traits that you like, but maybe not necessarily the ones that are built to play that style of hockey. They've missed Dakota Joshua this year. They've missed what he brought to the table last year in a big way. There's a chance he's going to play

tonight against St. Louis, but he hasn't been the same player as he was last season. Understandably, I suppose, but because of all the injuries, he also hasn't had that consistent role on the third line with Connor Garland and maybe Teddy Bluger. Yep. And I think that's been a factor as well. But I think this is the number one challenge for Rick Tauke.

This is right now the number one challenge for him is to figure out how to get more scoring chances out of his team. And it just can't be all created by Quinn Hughes. Right. And this does trickle down to other guys. I mean, right now you're looking at it and it's like, where are, this presence in this part of the ice, like where's Sherwood, where's Heinen,

where's the Brasque, where are some of these guys? Understanding that when you go through a prolonged scoring slump, oftentimes the best way to snap out of it is to go to the toughest parts of the ice and try and create from there. I do think at times the Canucks are fall into a comfort of perimeter. Like they, you know, whipping it around the outside,

getting it back to the point and then hoping that something bounces in off a guy, often becomes the default or the de facto. And it probably happens too often, right, in the game where it's like, well, here's, we've gained the offensive zone. What are we going to do? And then it's like, it's probably safer to just get it back to the point. What I don't understand, like I don't think Rick

Tauke is beyond criticism. Okay? I don't think he walks on water. I don't think he's the greatest coach of all time. I understand people's, and this goes to management too. I don't think he's the greatest coach of all time. I understand people's, um, and this goes to management too, I don't, I don't think they're perfect either, but you can actually need more puck movers on the back end.

There's no question about that. And sometimes in zone, when you've got, when you got set up, you want to have some guys that can make a pass, obviously, right? But I just don't see, like people blame this lack of slot shots on, on the system. Like, what is it about the system? Like you tell me specifically what target is, should do differently when the Canucks get

set up, like how can you create more chances? I'm open to it, right? I, I, I mean, he is clearly like, we're working on this and we're working on it. And, and, you know, whether or not he can answer this question is massive for him and for the team. Now this goes to the power play too. Like I'm including the power play on this. The power play is exactly the same

as when they get set up five on five. They perimeter, perimeter, perimeter, if they can get set up, perimeter, and then eventually, all right, get it back to Hughes and he'll dance around up there, open up a shooting lane and fire it on, like that is not how a power play should be working. I know the power play, when they had Horvat there,

I mean, again, this is possibly a personnel thing. Set them up in the bumper spot. It was just like, boom, perfect. One timer. That's, that's the type of goals I'm talking about creating these one timers where you're getting a clean shot and scoring. You see all these other teams, uh, getting

to the slot, making East West passes. What is going on with this team that they cannot create? They've got the talent to do it, I think, but maybe there's just a personnel issue there. You're listening to the best of Halford and Brough. You're listening to the best of Halford and Brough. You're listening to the best of Halford and Brough.

Can we just take a step back here? Yes. And ponder the question, what the hell happened to this team? Can we just do that? Sure. Because right now we're talking about next season, possibly the Canucks not having

is right now we're talking about next season possibly the Canucks not having Pederson, Miller, Besser, and Demko. That's the situation we're in right now. And if you guys are kind of speechless with this, I get it. But it just, it's shocking. I know it's the Canucks and I know we can't have nice things, but it's very possible that most, if not all four of those players that I mentioned will not be back next season. It was not that long ago that we were all gathered watching these Canucks in the playoffs and going, man, they got a game seven against the Oilers. This Corps has finally arrived. This Corps has finally figured out the leadership group. They've been empowered. They've been empowered. And now the leadership group, like one guy, the captain is like, I feel responsible for everything that's happened here. And the other two guys, Miller and Pedersen who are, again,

they wear letters, like they're part of the leadership group. They're on the trading block. And a lot of people seem to think that one of the big reasons they are is because they're fighting with each other. Like this is, you know, we've seen things go pear shaped for this Canucks team in the past, but this is, this, this might really take the cake, the way things are going.

And here's, uh, we're talking about Alias Pedersen, a guy who looked so dynamic last season in the first half of the season. And then the Canucks signed him to a massive contract extension, hasn't been the same player since. But they're working on it. What is- They practiced yesterday, they're working on it. What has happened to this team?

Do you want me to give you- What has happened to this team? Do you want me to give you the optimist's look at this, the glass half full look? Is that this team has gone through the same complete crisis that the New York Rangers went through and that somehow by the grace of God they'll work their way out of it. That core gets more of a benefit. It does. I'm not saying and look I know Eastwood is probably throwing stuff it is he already criticized me for comparing one team to another team when I did the Colorado Avalanche earlier. Yeah stop comparing other. Just talk about this team right now. Could this management group be looking at this

core and be like, well, it's not our core. We didn't put this. It is their core. No, like. They signed Miller. No, no, no, no. They signed Pedersen. They had, as far as drafting and developing,

but they're like, we'll give them a chance. Last year was their chance, but we don't believe that this is the core that can get it done. And we have to make changes. I'm just saying, is that maybe the angle they're going for? I would love to know what happened in their minds from going, we're going to give this guy the biggest contract in franchise history to, we

got to get rid of this guy. It's got to be the noise, man. It's got, it's got to be that whatever's been happening with this team this year behind the scenes that has to be. Well, what do you mean it's the noise? How about his play? How about his play on the ice?

Sure, but I think that's all linked. It's all one big thing. And whatever's happening with this team right now, they're like, we got to make a change. Something's wrong here, we got to change it. But I guess that's, like if you had, if we had Jim Rutherford on the show, and we'd love to have him by the way, if you're listening, Jim, come

on the show. He's not listening. Like isn't the first question not like what's going on here or why can't you guys get slot chances or what do you think about the goalie situation? Isn't the first question just like, what the hell happened? Yeah.

You know what my first question would be is actually in light of what we were just talking about. Would it be what the hell happened? No, it'd be is. Talk about the St. Louis Blues. Do you regret the Pedersen signing? I would ask him, do you think this season is salvageable?

I would ask him what the hell happened. I would ask him about the Pedersen signing. Because I'm more interested in what happens over the next 40 games, as opposed to what's happened previously. Because right now, they're at a borderline inflection point with the trades that they're considering, the contracts that are on the horizon,

and the fact that they are right on the precipice of either being in the playoffs or missing after getting back in last year and getting all the good vibes and all the good emotion back in the city. I would say, is this season salvageable in your eyes? Because if it is, then you're talking about a trade that probably doesn't involve futures,

but it's probably apples for apples, probably is more of a win now or a quote unquote hockey trade. If it's not, then you open up the possibility of, well, if we're going to move off one of these guys, why not move off two or three or four? I think it's, I think, with all due respect, I think it's a much bigger picture thing than the rest of this season.

We're talking about the next five or six years of this team, if they decide to trade Miller and Pedersen, the plan completely changes. And I haven't even talked about the likelihood of whether or not they're going to be able to keep quinues 733 on a Monday. Happy Monday everybody. Halford Brough Sportsnet 650. Halford and Brough of the morning is brought to you by Vancouver Honda, Vancouver's premier destination for Honda customers. They have a friendly, knowledgeable staff that can help with anything

you're looking for, sales, financing, service, or parts. We are in hour two of the program. Hour two is brought to you by Jason Hominuk from Jason.mortgage. If you love paying too much for your mortgage, then don't let Jason shop around to find the perfect mortgage for you. Visit him online at Jason.mortgage.

I think I have been very unclear in trying to explain things this morning, which is problematic for a radio host. So whose fault is that? Mine. Yeah. Okay. I was trying to compare earlier the Canucks to the avalanche of a couple

of years ago, only to show that, uh, teams can go, go through major renovations in a two year span, like real quick, right? That kind of got muddled. And then, uh, someone's, I think it was JDog the Car Hog, one of my favorite textures, suggested that I woke up today totally fine and brimming with optimism and positivity about the season.

Did I give away, did that what I did last segment? Well, it just seems like you're focused on the rest of this season more than you are on the big picture of the team. And for me, the big picture is taken over from the day to day. Yeah, no, I mean, that's totally valid. Yeah. I don't think it's hard not to look at the fact of

the red, any trade almost everybody. Like what I really enjoyed about last season was that we were able to get into a game by game basis. I'm out of that now. Like the Canucks won on Saturday. They sure did. They won on Saturday. Like, you know.

That's what I'm saying. That was kind of the point I was getting at with, no, but for me that's like, who cares? Like they're trying to trade. Well, you spent a lot of. JT Miller and Elias Pedersen. You did spend a long time breaking down like, you know, shots generated from the slot, right?

That's a game to game thing. That's not a big picture thing. I'm intellectually curious. Well, there's that part of it, but for me. And I'm curious about Rick Taukett's side of all this because we talked about how Miller might not be back, Pedersen might not be back, Besser might not be back, Demko might not be back.

There's a very small, there's a very significant possibility that Rick Taukett might not be back. Well, I'm very curious to get the thoughts of our next guest, Kevin Woodley from NHL.com and Ingold Magazine. A presentation of White Rock Hyundai joins us now on the Haliford and Brough show on Sportsnet 650. Good morning Kevin, how are you? I'm good, it's a good thing I have White Rock Hyundai to go to and cheer me up because I feel like I'm walking into a den of negativity. Like, what's going on here? As you said, you're coming off a win.

Are we not excited? Are we actually, is this mean that Bruff is on team Durance from a year ago, blow it all up? Well, you know what? I do like to, I framed it as I was being accused of being positive. How dare you? Like, I mean, I look, I get what you're saying, Bruff.

I'm pointing at Bruff right now. But I think that figuring out what they want to do for the second half of the season is very much a big picture view of it. I just feel like they're at an inflection point right now with all these trades floating around. Elliott Friedman going on national television on Saturday and saying he thought that Elias Pedersen was headed to Carolina. Like, it feels like it's going to go one way or the other. Either you pull it together for this season and you give it the old college try or you make these big bold moves where all of a sudden the direction of the franchise takes a totally

different course. Okay you're looking at it, are you talking to me? Okay I'm with you on, it can't continue as is. I understand why he's looking big picture because even after nights like the other night where they take the NHL leading Washington Capitals and beat them two to one, like there's still too much under the hood that just doesn't pass the smell test that just isn't going to work moving forward. So I'm kind of, I'm kind'm kinda on team rough with this one.

Like I think I understand the desire to look big picture because on a game by game basis, yeah, there's moments like that and they've had a few, but even in that one, right? Like the Caps weren't at their best, they were still in the game, they still, the underlying numbers, Vancouver generated. They were still in the game. They still the underlying numbers. Vancouver generated too high danger shots in that game.

Like two less than two expected goals. And that's become the norm. And that doesn't even if you pull off some wins because your defense is excellent. And you run into some teams that, you know, I mean, where I think we're at that point now where they're starting to run in teams that are kind of like, they're not looking past them like they did at the start of last season But they're certainly making decisions like hey Logan Thompson's the best goalie in the league. We're not gonna start them We're gonna break our rotation and give Charlie Linger in this one So I think big picture I'm with sort of

Bigger decisions need to be made because how it is right now just you know I it's just not working. It's hard to see a turnaround even after a win, as dramatic as the one required to actually have it mean anything. Do you see Thatcher Demko resigning with the Canucks? I think it's too early for that. Do I see the Canucks offering him eight and a quarter, which is what the market rate is for a guy of his talent level.

And I fully expect him to get back to displaying that level at some point. I can't tell you when, uh, I think you just have to look at how long it took Jeremy Swainman to find his game and then do the math on how much harder Thatcher's road back to this has been than Jeremy Miskamp in preseason. Thatcher missed his entire offseason and two months of the way. It's like trying to catch a moving train and the more I look at it, I'm not trying to make excuses, but I've got some empathy there for how hard this must be. We know what the talent level is. So I expect him to get back to that. The question becomes given all the time missed over the last number of years, are the Canucks willing to go to eight and a quarter?

Because that's going to be the market rate. Whether he wants to be back or not, you start to hear rumblings about whether they feel they can they can trust that. So I'm not sure. And I think judging it based on right now probably isn't fair to him and isn't representative of what he is and can be. Um, I just can't tell you how long until we get that back. And because of the fight for a playoff spot that they're in, you know, like, is

anyone expecting anyone other than Kevin Lichen and tonight in St. Louis? Probably not. So, um, you know, that's where we're at. Like it's really tough too, because there where we're at. Like, it's really tough too because they're so bad at the start of games. And I think that was the case even in Washington. Like, this is the one thing that Kevin Lankin has done for them is bail them out early and allow them to either stay in games and

find their feet or, you know, in the case of Washington, get two Queen Hughes Brilliance and some screens and hang on. The hardest part for Demco is, cause it's funny, I thought it looked like something might've clicked in the Edmonton game, like in the second period. All of a sudden it was like the movement, the side to side, the laterals,

the early eyes leading, the vision leading, like there was something, I was like, hey, whoa, whoa, whoa, I was looking at the team. I'm like the Leonardo DiCaprio meme, right? Like I'm like, Oh, I know that guy. I'm like, Hey, like sometimes it all takes is like that one moment, that one thing to click. The problem for Demko is it's five, nothing by that point. And the way this team starts games, like he can't, it takes rhythm and timing, take time to find after this long an absence. And by the time he finds it in a game, it's five nothing.

So, yeah, that's a really tough one. And, you know, I've been critical at times, you know, wondered about the process, wondered about all the other things that have changed around him in addition to all the time he's missed. But at the end of the day, I think you have to grant a little grace at just how hard this probably is for him and how hard it is for any goalie to come back off an absence like that. And, and, and again, we're starting to see Swainman

pick up his power Swainman in Boston of late. And all he did was miss camp and look how long that took. Uh, is there any more gossip on the goalie chat thread? No, no, no, no gossip. I've been shut out of the gossip thread. No, no. Uh, but boy does this team, you know, I, I don't know if you got into the numbers, but you said

you might be, we might be talking some offense and boy, do they not make it easy on their goalies. I go back to a conversation I had in the Meeker Kiprasoff era, uh, of the Calgary Flames around the league with goalies and it sort of fueled how I think about teams that can't score ever since and it was the question I asked you guys was would you rather be in Calgary with Kipr where under Darrell Sutter and they went to a cup final this way they didn't give up anything but you knew one or two might be one or two too many right like it

didn't matter like great defense but you made a mistake they weren't gonna bail you out or would you rather be on a team that plays it a little loose but hey they can get you three or four even if you know if you make a mistake and to a man when I asked that question around the league and usually everyone from time to time I'll revisit it with guys coming into town they all said yeah, yeah, and inherently as a goal, you want a great defense, but give me the team that can score. Give me the team where I don't have to go into the game with the pressure of one or two being one or two too many.

And when you look at the offensive and the generation, um, that this team has or does not have, like that's where we're at. I keep looking at these nights where the expected goals are consistently below two. We've had a couple where it's below one, which you just never see, where it's like one or two high danger chances. And then I looked into the numbers

after texting with you last night, Jason, and it's just like, you know, I think you've done slot shots or passes into the slot. Well, ClearSight doesn't measure passes in, but slot shots in general, 30 seconds. Slot line, the one that really matters, across the middle, 28th. Screens, the one that I've been going about,

like hey, because they can work, like Quinn Hughes' second one, that was the one. You hit that top corner through a layered screen. That goes in more often than a breakaway, but it's not easy to do. And guess what? When you're 30th in the league in screenshots, you're probably not getting enough of them rebounds, 28 in the league.

That speaks to not getting pucks and bodies to the net, not having guys willing to fight to that area. Something talk it focused on in practice yesterday. One-timers 25th. Hey, deflections. They're 10th clear sighted shots. And honestly, you don't want to leave the league in this because these are the ones that goalies stop like 99% of the time. They're 29th. Broken plays, scrambles,

pucks that hit legs and sticks in front and lead to chaos. 31st again speaks to an inability or an unwillingness to get to those areas consistently enough. And that's not just its bodies but it's also funneling pucks there and it doesn't always have to be from the point or taking pucks to the net. Again, another thing that talk it's talked about of late. Breakaways, 31st. Like it's, it's not pretty offensively right now. And it wasn't that, here's the thing, it wasn't that bad. They're 25th and five on five, expected goals for 25th in the rush, 12th in zone overall. But all of those numbers cratered.

This is, I couldn't figure out like, where do I delineate? Where do I start? So I went JT coming back and JT leaving, you know, those numbers were like the rush stuff hasn't been there all year, despite their best efforts. And I think their focus on it in training camp was a problem because it put the focus of this team in the wrong spot. They don't have the personnel for it, especially on the back end, getting the puck up to start rush.

So they've been in the bottom third of the league of that throughout, but they were fifth before JT leaves in five on five chances for, they were third in zone, they were 15th on the, like all these numbers that have cratered before that leave of absence were all trending in the right direction.

They started down and then after he comes back, the bottom just falls out. I know you talked about where him and Pedersen, I believe you talked about where they rank in terms of getting pucks to the middle, passes into the slot for shots, but the reality is since JT left on that lead, this team has just fallen off a cliff offensively. The defense has picked up, but like I said, in the Kiprsov argument, that's not enough. So is your conclusion the noise then? Like this team just doesn't have the jump or what is going on? Because there seems to be a clear debate going on.

And some people are in the players got to play better, especially their top dogs like Miller and Pedersen and other people are in the players got to play better, especially their top dogs like Miller and Pedersen and other people are on. This is entirely the system. This is entirely Rick Tocque not putting his players in positions to succeed. Do you lean what, like I lean on the, the players got to play better angle.

Obviously I'm not taking Tocett's responsibility out of this, but that's where I lean. Where do you lean? No, I mean, I don't think you can completely take the blame off anyone when it's that bad. Like I think everybody has to look at themselves when it's that bad. You know, and I said this on Friday with Durant,

it's like that includes management in terms of, you know, how they've built it. with Durant, it's like, um, that includes management in terms of, you know, how they've built it. Some of the guys they add as much as they bring certain elements, you know, are they a little light when it comes to all those things we just talked about getting into. And we've heard talk it used that phrase light getting into those dangerous areas, being winning, willing to win the battles, get to that space and get to a secondary pot, get to a rebound chance. So you're not 28 in the league. Um, so it goes back to that coaching field appearing to cut the corner financially on some of the

assistant coaching decisions right down to the American league. Um, you know, there are elements there, but I primarily look at the player. Let me talk at practice yesterday. If you read Jeff Patterson's tweets and saw some of the questions after, you know, I pretty much split player and we talk at practice yesterday. If you read Jeff Patterson's tweets and saw some of the questions after, you know, I pretty much split defense and offense and the defense was about breakouts and getting the puck out. And the offense is about all the things we just talked about, like not deferring back to the point every time.

I mean, when the coach is talking about there's place to be made into the middle, into the slot, whether it's passes or actively just taking the puck there and that we would defer too much to the top. Like that's the other thing that going, if you're willing to go there only after you've passed the puck to the top, you effectively clog it because you drag the defense with you, right? You bring five, they're five into that box, into that slot area. Like you're not spreading them out at all. And by consistently and constantly deferring up to the top of the ice.

And then even if you do go to the net, clogging it up, like you're kind of eliminating some of the space you're hoping to open. I know we talked about passers into the slot. Like I think the fact they haven't figured out a power play bumper is a massive part of that as well. Like they just haven't had it since bow and they haven't tried to establish it.

I think there are questions to be asked. I heard them on the post game show talking about offensive zone starts for their best offensive players. Fair questions. But to me at the end of the day, it comes down to the players and something's clearly changed there. Uh, there are too many nights where the effort just isn't good enough. Kev enjoyed the game tonight.

Uh, thanks for joining us and- Well, how can I now with all that positivity that I just spewed for you? Yeah. I'll try. Slot shots, slot shots. A quick trip to Hawaii Rockhound this afternoon. I have like free coffee and it's great. Like they just take care of you there.

So I'll find my happy Woody. Enjoy Kev, have a good one buddy. Bye. Kevin Woodley from NHL.com and Engel Magazine here on the Halford and Brough show on Sportsnet 650. Did you just say I'll find my happy Woody? He will find his happy Woody. Okay, I'm just checking. Just want to make sure. He is a presentation of White Rock Hyundai.

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