Bieksa Makes Canucks Hockey Fun!

Okay...I'm bored. So I thought who better to write about than Kevin Bieksa. He seems to be in the highlight reels a lot lately.

We've all watched the Vancouver Canucks play their games without any energy, interest or effort since they played the Boston Bruins on Jan 7, 2012 and still manage to win their games somehow.  They may not have even deserved to win them sometimes but still managed to in utter bewilderment of Canuck fans everywhere.  Now although they have been lethargic lately, they have been entertaining us in one form or another.  I'm talking about Mr. Kevin Bieksa.  Let's go through some of those games where the highlight reels have been of Bieksa entertaining the fans.

Canucks vs Red Wings, December 21, 2011.  Bieksa shows concern for Kesler as he comes over and wipes away the blood from Kes's face after taking a hit from Kronwall.

Here's Bieksa getting some payback on Filppula for the Kronwall hit on Kesler.

 Canucks vs Sharks on December 28, 2011.  Bieksa scores a goal...or did he?  Team celebrates with Bieksa for the game winning goal. 3-2 in OT. 

Canucks vs Kings on December 31, 2011.  Bieksa gets the last goal of the year by a Canuck and the only goal for the Canucks.

Canucks SuperSkills on Jan 22, 2012.  Kevin Bieksa gets harrased by three little girls (Makyala Kesler, Reese Bieksa and Anna Hamhuis) while trying to watch a competition.

Canucks Organization and Bieksa launch Mindcheck.ca in memory of Rick Rypien on January 23, 2012.

Take the Pledge.

Canucks vs Avalanche, February 4, 2012.  Bieksa dives to save an empty net goal on one end of the rink only to get back up and score a goal after taking an awesome pass from the stanchion at the other end.

This is the second time that Bieksa has received an awesome pass from the stanchion.  The first time coming in Game 5 of the Western Conference Final against the San Jose Sharks in double overtime that sent the Canucks to the Stanley Cup Final last year.

Thought this was cute. The chemistry between the two is undeniable.

Canucks vs Wild, February 9,  2012.  Bieksa gets mad at Clutterbuck who's trying to fight Hamhuis and throws his glove at him.

Canucks vs. Coyotes, Feb 13, 2012.  Bieksa tries to entertain the crowd by flipping a puck off the glass and trying to catch it behind his back.  Referee Wheeler comes over to help him and ends up getting a big 'ol handful of Boom Boom.  Yes...I'm jelous.

The "Money Shot".  Bieksa getting groped by the linesman.

Bieksa promises Klesla to fight him next time after the Refs pull them apart at the end of the game.  Next match-up is on Feb 28th.  Stay tuned...

Canucks vs. Maple Leafs, Feb 18, 2012.  Bieksa scores a goal after the Canucks put on a passing clinic in the slot.

Canucks vs Oilers, Feb 19, 2012.  Bieksa scores on a point shot assisted by Weise.

So that's it so far....I'm sure there will be more this week with a game against the Nashville Predators and the Detroit Red Wings coming up this week.  Stay tuned for more Bieksa updates.

Canuck Animal Names - Who Are They??

Your next Canuck animal identity is about to be revealed.  Let's re-cap the Canuck animal names already revealed in prior posts.

Kevin Bieksa = Wolverine

Alex Edler = Eagle

Jannik Hansen = Honey Badger

Your fourth Canuck Animal Name belongs to Sami Salo. The owl has great eyesight, sense of hearing and is a fearful opponent.  The damage is usually done before its prey even knows what hit them.  Just like how stealthy he is shooting his crazy blast of a slap shot from the blue line. The opponent never sees it coming. The owl can also take down prey 3 times larger than him.  Just like Salo. 

Sami Salo = Owl

Hockey Day in Canada 2012

Yesterday, Hockey Day in Canada was held all over our Country and celebrated everything that was great about our national sport.  In Richmond, BC, Hockey Day in Canada was being hosted at the infamous Olympic Venue, The Oval.  It was the first time I had been to this site.  I never had a chance to get out there during the Olympics as I was too busy volunteering for it and the Oval, unfortunately, wasn't accessible enough to any skytrain stations.

 My friend and fellow volunteer, Leslie-Anne (LA) decided we would go to this event after she called me up last week and told me about it.  I had never heard of Hockey Day in Canada being held in BC before so I do believe this is s a first.  We were even wondering how we never even heard or saw any website as to volunteering for this event.  In any case, I think this was one event that I would have liked to have sat out as a volunteer and just enjoyed it as a fan.

So after I picked up LA from skytrain we headed off to breakfast at IHOP and once we were done it was off to the Richmond Oval.  LA had never been there either cause she was also busy volunteering for the Olympics.  We found some free parking at the Worksafe BC parking lot and walked over to the Oval which was close by.  As we walked in the building, we were handed an orange canvass bag with the Richmond Oval logo on it.  Inside it had an NHL Hockey 2011-2012 Sticker Book and many pamphlets on the Oval.  Before heading up the stairs to the second floor where all the activities were, we decided we better head to the bathroom first cause that morning coffee was going right thru us!  As we came out of the bathroom, we ran into a giant Hockey Night in Canada Puck Mascot!  LA and I had a pic taken with it later but i accidentally deleted it last night from my camera before I downloaded them when I got home. Grrrrrrrr!

He wasn't the only mascot there though.  Jack the Giants Mascot was there along with some others that I didn't recognize but the most famous one was there! Fin, the Canucks Mascot!  He played referee for some peewee games and then took pics with kids and did some autograph signings and pics for the big kids too.  Fin is always popular where ever he goes.

Just across from Fin's table, there was a huge line-up for Trevor Linden's autograph session. The line up started at the red tent and winded up three times up and down before it came straight out ending across from Fin's table. LA and I didn't bother getting in line as really, we had nothing for him to autograph and plus, we're sports volunteers.  We'll see him at the next sporting event as he's usually around.

The volunteers there were really nice and the one at Trevor's tent saw me trying to get a pic of him above everyone's head so she let me get in front of her to take the pic.

 There were three red Scotia Bank tents at that end of the oval.  The first tent had the "Hardest Shot" competition, the second tent had a big banner which you got to write about your favorite hockey memory and afterwards you got to choose between a red scarf, red helmet hat or a red toque with a brim as your Hockey Day in Canada souvenir.  I chose the scarf.

They also had four of the NHL trophies there.  It was roped off in the middle of the court so you couldn't get too close like we were able to at Rogers Arena during training camp. So, using my crappy camera, I took some pics of the Trophies.  Wanna guess which one this is??

Yes...its the President's Trophy.  Such a beautiful trophy.  So glad the Canucks won this baby...hopefully we get to keep it for another year.  Detroit can't win every game, right??

Daniel Sedin's prize for the 2010-2011 year.  The Hart Trophy.  So pretty.

The Maurice "Rocket" Richard Trophy.  Former Canuck, Pavel Bure won this trophy 3 times during his years with the club.  What a pleasure he was to watch.  I truly miss him. Hopefully, the Canucks will retire his jersey one day.

The Sedins' back to back trophy win.  The Art Ross Trophy.  How amazing is it to have twins who won this thing one after the other.  We will never see another two players with their talent for passing and scoring.  Celebrate the Sedins while we have them Vancouver cause one day they will go back to Sweden to raise their families and that time is very soon.  I will be sad to see them go.

As far as other activities goes, there were two ice rinks side by side and there were activities happening in both.  In the first one, they had training staff from the Vancouver Canucks working with the Seafair peewee team.  I watched some of their drills and thought they were so cute.  One of the drills had a trainer stand in front of the line while the peewees had to stand behind him in single file and push him as a team to the other end of the rink.

At the rink right next to this one, there was a Junior game going on. The Richmond Sockeyes vs. North Delta Devils and Mark Donnelly sang the national anthem.  He's good.  The Richmond Sockeyes ended up winning that game.  Lots of people turned out to watch as they had to bring in bleachers so people could sit and watch.  In the crowd I also spotted Jim Robson.  The Canucks former play by play personality.  He was wearing a red Canada jersey.  I also spotted the CBC crew trying to film some of the on-ice stuff.

There were tons of hockey card trading and buying going on.  I wanted to get some but really don't know much about hockey cards and what to look for so I didn't bother.  They had some really really old ones. For entertainment they had the two hockey guys on stilts with a referee doing some comic routines for the kids. They also had a big screen on one end where you could watch the hockey games all day long.  The schedule here is shown in Eastern Time.

They were going to show the Canucks game later that night at 7pm PST and we thought we'd be busy enough all day that we would be able to stay and watch but it was only 3 pm and we were pretty much done with all the events at the Oval.  Everything kinda ended at 3:30pm until the hockey game.  So we decided to head back to Surrey and kill some time in a mall and then headed to the Central City Brewing Co and watched the game there.

Canucks lost in the shootout to the Calgary Flames 3-2.  Oh well....lets hope the boyz can re-group and win the 3 game home-stand they have coming up this week.

All in all, I really enjoyed Hockey Day in Canada.  I hope they have it again in BC next year.

Whitecaps Acquire Sebastien Le Toux!

Your newest Whitecaps FC player was acquired on January 31, 2012.  He originally played for the Sounders in the USL years but was left unprotected by the team when moving to the MLS.  The Phillidelphia Union picked him up in the draft and made him into a fan favorite.  It helped that Le Toux scored 25 combined goals in the last two years for their club.  Le Toux was acquired by the Whitecaps for allocation money and now he finds himself back in the Pacific Northwest and so far, he's warmed up to the idea.  He's just glad to feel wanted again....especially by a club like Vancouver.

Learn more about Le Toux

Position: Forward
Number: 7
Height: 6'0
Weight: 155 lbs.
Birth Date: October 1, 1984
Birthplace: Mont-Saint-Aignan, France

Last Club: Phillidelphia Union
How Acquired: Exchanged for allocation money

Twitter Addy: @SebastienLeToux

Canuck Animal Names - Who Are They??

I was looking at my blog stats today and saw a few people searching for Kevin Bieksa's animal name.  So I thought I would share it this week with all of you.  Its no secret that Bieksa sits on the tribal council that hands out the names to his teammates and that he's also got loose lips.  As much as he keeps saying on Team 1040 Radio interviews that he can't let everyone's name out of bag, he keeps revealing someone every time he's asked.  This time however, he revealed his name in a madlib story that Derek Jory, Canucks blogger, made up for him.  At the end of the mad lib, Bieksa signs his name as  Kevin "Wolverine" Bieksa.  Thus, revealing to us his animal name.

The first line of the mad lib starts off...well....like Kevin.

"First things first, it's BEE-ecks-ah, NOT Bee-eska. I'm looking at you MOM."

and ends with

"Kevin WOLVERINE Bieksa (BEE-ecks-ah)"

For everything in between, read Bieksa, by Bieksa written by Derek Jory and filled in by Bieksa, himself. So there you have it folks! Kevin Bieksa has revealed himself as the "Wolverine".

Kevin Bieksa = Wolverine

The Wolverine is probably more of a bad-ass than the Honey Badger.  They are very territorial creatures and will defend to no end.  They go up against bigger animals such as the Bear (think Chara), Grey Wolves,  Timber Wolves and many other animals.  They are not animals you want to mess with.  Great comparisons to our great Defenceman, Kevin Bieksa.  One of our two shut-down defencemen on the Canucks team and after yesterday afternoon's performance, very fitting.

See the badass Wolverine at work in his natural habitat. With Kevin Bieksa's liking for rap songs as the background.  So gangsta!

And if you missed Bieksa's performance yesterday...here it is. Enjoy!!

Re-Cap of Women's Olympic Qualifying Games So Far..Day 8

Finally!! The match-up that everyone knew was coming had finally come!  This was the last day of the tournament and at this point, Canada and the USA had already qualified for the two spots going to represent at the London 2012 Summer Olympics.  The winner of this match would get a better seed but mainly more for bragging rights.  Afterall, it is Canada vs USA.  It was the only match up of the day and we were expecting it to be seriously busy in the Hospitality Suites.   People started to stream in right at 4pm.  They came early to find the Amway kiosk where you could use markers to make signs, they came early to get food and also to enjoy some of the atmosphere.  We knew the Canadian crowd was going to be huge and we've seen the Americans fill up most of our stadium as well  on USA game nights so we knew there was gonna be a lot of people there.  We weren't dissapointed.  We broke another record with the attendance.  This time it was 24,427 and trust me, it was loud in there.  The atmosphere took on the feel of an Olympic stature. Almost felt like it was the 2010 Olympics again. There were tons of Canadian flags flying and tons of red and white was displayed.

This was the pretty hardware up for grabs.

The majority of the suites were converted into the CSA (Canadian Soccer Association) hospitality suites.  USA only had one suite.  We were expecting delegates from all over representing FIFA.  One of the representatives from the West Indies took my hand and flirted with me asking me if I've ever been to the West Indies before and told me he thought I was beautiful...haha! I really just wanted my hand back.  I told this to my Managers downstairs on break and someone chirped in "You should have asked if he had a sister!"...yeah...I guess that would have gotten my hand back! I'll have to try that one next time I'm being flirted with to death! Just one of the hazards of being a hospitality volunteer.

All the suites were full and there were a lot of athletes wandering the halls looking for beer and food.  So my team and I were happy to direct them.  I helped some french FIFA officials find their way outside so they could have a smoke and come back in as well.   The Ushers, my team and I watched the game from the hallways outside the suites and we all watched as our Canadian girls were struggling getting the ball in the net.  They had 3 great chances and hit the post or went wide of the goal.  The Americans on the other hand were having no problem finding the back of our net.  In the end, the Americans were too polished, poised and confident in their game to lose. The match ended in a 4-0 loss to the Americans.

After the match ended, they started to convert the pitch into the ceremony area where both teams would be presented with their gold and silver medals respectively.  Christine Sinclair and her team were called up to the stage first to receive their silver medals and the entire stadium saluted them on a job well done.  Everyone was proud of our ladies in red.  Their main objective was to gain the ticket to London 2012 Olympics and they had accomplished that.

This is the stage being rolled onto the centre of the pitch for the medal ceremony.

Canadian team being congratulated and receiving their silver medals.  Sorry, its kinda fuzzy.

After the ceremonies were over and all the fans or most of the fans had left the building, the volunteers from all the departments got to go onto the pitch and have a team picture taken by a professional photographer.  So this is us sauntering onto the pitch headed towards the Champions sign.

We had to wait for more of the departments to show up before taking the picture.

But first we had to wait for the photographer to show up!! I'm sure it turned out great. I'll share it once I receive it!

I had a lot of fun during this tournament.  Not only did I get to see my volunteering family again but I also got to be part of something great.  I love soccer next to hockey so anytime I can volunteer for this sport I do.  I was an Usher at the FIFA U-20 tournament in 2007 at Swangard and had an awesome time and I knew that the women's tournament wouldn't be a disappointment either.  I knew half the Canadian National Women's Team as they used to be Whitecaps players and all used to come sit in my tunnel for special appearances as the CNT or just to chill.  It was amazing seeing and meeting all the different teams and their staffs from all over the world.  I even got to use my very very limited Spanish. I'm glad that Vancity came out and supported the team in record numbers.  It makes me proud to be a volunteer in Vancity when I see the support from the community for our sport athletes.  They work so hard all their lives to get to where they are its only fit that they get the support from the fans.  I came away with an experience of a lifetime and hopefully will be back for 2015 when Vancity will host the Womens World Cup FIFA tournament.  We also have a bid out for the 2014 U-20 Womens World Cup Soccer! After this turnout, I'm sure it helped our chances on that!

 And thats all she wrote folks!!

Re-Cap of Women's Olympic Qualifying Games So Far..Day 7

This was the big night! Canada vs Mexico.  Canada would advance to the London 2012 Olympics if they were to win their match.  It was especially crazy busy inside BC Place that day.  There were tons of media and the fans came out in record attendance to cheer on the ladies in red and white.  The earlier match of the United States and the Costa Rica was settled with a 3-0 score in favor of the US.  That wasn't really news.  We all knew the States were one of the teams going to London.  It just wasn't a sure bet on the Canadian women.  Mexico was going to be a challenge for the ladies.  Mexico had a great team.  They were cool, sharp and made clean crisp passes.  Plus they could score. 

As my team and I were up in the hospitality suite areas, we found it very busy up there from the very first match.  People were streaming in constantly and we were kept busy.  We armed ourselves with Canada Soccer tattoos to give out to the little tots walking in with their parents.  The parents were really appreciative of that and the kids loved them.

As we had some downtime when the game was on, I sent a few of my people to go on break or sit and watch the game for a few minutes before halftime or the end of the game.  They were very appreciative of that as well.  There were plenty of TV's in the hallway as well so the Ushers and myself could watch while still helping people as they strolled in late.

A few of the interesting people to come by the suites were Olympic Organizing Committee members, John Furlong and Charmaine Crooks.  The Vancouver mayor, Gregor Robertson also stopped by to have a meeting with the Canadian Soccer Association.  So I had one of my hospitality members escort him through to the proper suite.  A friend and fellow volunteer also showed up. He's a referee with the Soccer Association and him and his friend wanted to meet with the Referees whom they knew.  So I escorted them in and out after letting the Usher know I would take them. The Canadian National Women's team put on a show and scored 4-1 that night over Mexico and thus leap frogging them into the last spot for the London 2012 Olympics.  After the match, the ladies saluted the "SouthSiders" corner for their continuous support thoughout the tournament.  They then headed down the field and saluted the crowd.  Here are some pics from that night.

Stadium attendance of 22, 954.  Vancity broke the record for attendance at any CONCACAF Women's Tournament.

 

Canadian Women's Team thanking the fans for their support.

American Women's Team thanking their fans for their support.