After another decisive road loss during a post season that has had its share of dizzying heights and now back-breaking lows (with all apologies to Mason Raymond), the members of good ship Canuck were all heard to declare they had once again turned the page and were only thinking about game 7.  At this time of year, there are no lessons to learn, no fires to be lit, just keep marching on.  Alfred E. Neuman never had it so good.  “What, Me Worry?”, indeed.

Here at Critically Canuck, we have been on board with the glass is half full approach during this post season, but last night’s tilt has us instead wanting to finish off whatever might be left in that glass.  Enough already.

As he is whenever the Canucks lose, Roberto Luongo was once again under the microscope last night.  While we’ve had his back all post-season reasoning that most of his poor games were the result of defensive breakdowns in front off him, Roberto must take the fall for last night’s loss.  And to his credit, he did.  In a confessional like post-game scrum, Luongo owned up to his poor play.

But that was the only truth to be told from the Canucks’ side of things. 

Despite another poor road outing, a debilitating injury to Mason Raymond and more after-the-whistle mistreatment from the Bruins’ sewer rats, you couldn’t find any fire and brimstone around these Canucks.

While the Bruins can point to their solid road play and rightly declare that they should have deserved at least one win in Vancouver by now, the Canucks haven’t come close to performing the same feat in Boston.  But at least they don’t need to worry about that anymore.

And on a hit that was easily as “dirty” (if you don’t believe us, check out the NBC footage) as anything Aaron Rome could ever offer up, Mason Raymond is lost for up to six months.  So in the new era of NHL justice which seemingly sees fits to offer up an “eye for eye”, we should all expect Johnny Boychuk to be similarly suspended.  As if. 

And while you might be able to forgive the Boston fans’ shameless taunting of the fallen Raymond in the heat of the momemt, why did he have to be helped off the ice by only his teammates?  Where was the back-board and stretcher.  Insult to injury, indeed.

The point is there is plenty to be fired up about.  Where there should be passion and fury and promises of redemption, we get the same old mindless jibber jabber about preparation and process as if the next game isn’t the 7th game of the Stanley Cup Final, but an SAT exam.

There is a vast difference in the leadership styles of this team and the last Canuck version to get this close to the Stanley Cup.  It is hard to imagine Pat Quinn, on the heels of another embarrassing road loss, to address the post game media scrum with a mantra of “it doesn’t matter”.  And we know that liberties taken with star players would have been met with flying elbows from said star player (so says Pavel Bure’s elbow to Shane Churla’s head).  Or instead, a beat down from Sergio Momesso or Tim Hunter. 

And when their captain cheap shotted our captain in the waning moments of game 6, that only motivated our captain to produce a legendary game 7 performance that resulted in his number 16 hanging from the rafters.  The more likely response this time around is our captain clutching his abdomen in agony attempting to draw one more penalty that we won’t score on. 

So where does that leave the faithful?  Well, there’s really only one option.  The leadership mantra this time around isn’t about to change.  And it’s got us this far, right?  Think positive.  Be prepared.  Stick with the process.  And for one more game, that’s just what we’ll do. Even if it sounds too much like we’re drinking the kool-aid…