Vancouver Canucks players celebrate a third-period goal against Chicago Blackhawks goaltender Cristobal Huet in Vancouver, B.C., on January 23, 2010.DARRYL DYCK
With three of the Vancouver Canucks' top four defencemen out with injury, the high-octane Chicago Blackhawks were supposed to thrive Saturday night.
Instead, the Canucks displayed a stiff offensive punch of their own, storming out to a 3-0 first-period lead on the way to a 5-1 victory.
Henrik Sedin, with two, Mikael Samuelsson, Steve Bernier and Daniel Sedin scored for Vancouver (31-19-2), which won its fourth straight game.
Jonathan Toews replied for Chicago (35-13-4), which dropped to 3-2 on a season-high eight-game road trip.
Missing their shutdown defensive pairing of Willie Mitchell (upper body) and Sami Salo (groin), as well as feisty Kevin Bieksa (severed ankle tendons), the Canucks relied on strong goaltending, a bend-but-don't break defence and an opportunistic offence.
Vancouver got a goal from each of its top three lines in the first as Samuelsson and Henrik Sedin struck 3:02 apart midway through the period.
Samuelsson was the beneficiary of some nice work from Ryan Kesler. After grazing the post, Kesler poked it out front to Samuelsson, who was alone to pot his 17th goal of the year.
Alex Burrows, who extended his points streak to 11 games (13 goals and five assists) with three assists, was the key man on the second goal. The pesky forward intercepted Brent Seabrook's pass and fed Henrik Sedin, who took the puck to the net and eventually banged in his own rebound for his 22nd of the season.
Vancouver's third line of Bernier, Pavol Demitra and Kyle Wellwood got in on the act later in the period.
Demitra slid a Christian Ehrhoff rebound over to Bernier, who broke an 11-game goalless drought by backhanding a shot past Chicago netminder Antti Niemi.
Niemi, who started consecutive games for the first time this year, was pulled in favour of Cristobal Huet to start the second. The Blackhawks responded by hemming the Canucks in their own zone for much of the period and went on to outshoot Vancouver 18-6 in the third.
But Vancouver's defence held tough.
Thanks to standout performances from Ehrhoff and Alex Edler - who each logged more than 25 minutes - as well as contributions from American Hockey League call-ups Nolan Baumgartner and Brad Lukowich, the Canucks were able to keep Chicago's shooters to the perimeter.
When the Blackhawks did find a hole in Vancouver's armour, Roberto Luongo was there for the save.
The workhorse goalie, making his 22nd straight start, had one of his better games over the past month.
His favourite victim wasn't Patrick Kane or Toews, but Ben Eager.
The rugged winger had three quality chances - two of them in-close backhanders and another partial breakaway - but was foiled each time.
Luongo's best stop came midway through the third period, when somehow he gloved Cam Barker's rocket shot from the point despite missing his goal stick.
Luongo had a bit of luck too, as Kane hit the post with a wrist shot with the score 2-0 midway through the first.
The lone Blackhawk to beat Luongo was Toews, who backhanded a Niklas Hjalmarsson rebound into an open net 3:30 into the third period.
But Henrik Sedin restored the three-goal lead 32 seconds later, one-timing brother Daniel's pass off the far post and in.
Henrik Sedin returned the favour to Daniel Sedin with 1:26 remaining, setting up his brother on a 2-on-1. The puck went in off Daniel Sedin's skate, but was upheld after a video review.
NOTES: The Canucks improved to 2-1 against Chicago this season. ... Henrik Sedin extended his points streak to four games (three goals, seven assists), as did Daniel Sedin (two goals, seven assists). Henrik upped his league-leading points total to 74, four ahead of Alexander Ovechkin. ... Canucks C Rick Rypien missed his third straight game with the flu. F Jannik Hansen was a healthy scratch for his second straight game. ... D Jordan Hendry was the lone scratch for Chicago.