Seriously?

Like most people, I wasn’t exactly thrilled with the bands that were involved with the closing ceremonies to the Winter Games Sunday night. Inward Eye, Simple Plan, Hedley, Nickelback and Avril Lavigne to close out the biggest international sporting event held in Canada in over 22 years? Horrible.

The NHL trade deadline came and went earlier this afternoon and man, what a difference it made with these new look Canucks. What do you mean, we only traded for one NHL regular? Oh well.

Amazing how tonight’s game worked out. Second game of a back to back, Luongo playing his first post-Olympics game against Detroit on the road, all signs pointed to a Canucks loss. But it was not meant to be!

Mike Gillis didn’t go hog wild on the trade deadline, as he continued to play a conservative game with his picks and prospects. While his contemporaries were doling out 2nd rounders like candy, Gillis, who didn’t have a 2nd rounder in this year’s draft, decided to be a little more creative with his wheeling and dealing, heading over to the bargain bins of the various NHL teams.

Gone are Mathieu Schneider, PC Labrie and a 3rd round draft pick.

Coming in are Yan Stastny, Andrew Alberts, Sean Zimmerman and a potential 6th rounder.

Been a while. I think it might take a while to get back into the swing of things.

That goes for both my blog posts AND the Canucks. What a weird first period that was. The NHL trade deadline is tomorrow and I’m feverently hoping and praying that Gillis is going to do something to address the problems with our defense and our bottom six. The first goal surrendered was a bottom pairing/bottom line disaster. Aaron Rome or Nolan Baumgartner Were on the ice for all three goals against. That Brad Lukowich was sent down on waivers today gives me hope that there’s a deal in the works to bring in another quality defenseman.

So the Olympics are over. Boo. Now, everyone has to go back to watching mighty teams like the Carolina Hurricanes and the Toronto Maple Leafs battle it out for the right to lay sole claim to the NHL’s basement.

But before we get into that, everyone’s still basking in the glow of Team Canada’s victory on Sunday. I’d just like to point out that I more or less correctly called how things would go for Canada to get to the gold medal game (Slovaks scoring the upset over Sweden, Russia having problems and Canada coming out huge against them.) Sometimes a blind squirrel finds a nut!

While everyone’s focused on Roberto Luongo’s performance as a goalie (my opinion? He finally cemented himself as a legitimate big game/name goaltender) I thought I’d go in another direction and focus on another Canuck who had a huge Olympics. Pavol Demitra, who led the tournament in scoring and led Slovakia to their highest ever finish at the Olympics (and losing in what could only be described as a heartbreaker of a loss) is going to be having some mighty high expectations now that we’re going back to NHL hockey.

What’s hard, black, thick and made in Slovakia? More importantly, do you want to win Canucks tickets? Check the details below.