Black Ice Vancouver

“All my pretty ones? Did you say all? Oh hell-kite! All? What all my pretty chickens and their dam at one fell swoop?” -Macbeth

The Westcoast Express.

That fabled scoring unit from a by-gone era that swept the hearts and minds of the local hockey community into a frenzy for three-and-a-half seasons. Then it all came crashing to a halt. At one fell swoop Todd Bertuzzi ripped a sucker punch so deep into the back of Steve Moore’s cranium that even those hipsters on the tilt in Crab Park took notice. The most potent scoring trio (including Markus Naslund) in Vancouver history was reduced to rubble. Expectation for the team and the city vanished. The collective wisdom that dark and stormy March evening was things would never be the same.

It was a train-wreck of myopic proportions.

Brendan Morrison was always the unsung hero of the WestCoast Express. He played between the machismo rage of Todd Bertuzzi and the European gentility of Markus Naslund. He was the scale in the balance of power on a line combination that dominated the NHL . Between Naslund’s sensitive wrist shot and Bertuzzi’s blind ferocity was Brendan Morrison, the consummate hockey statesman, Northern gentleman and local boy.

Morrison never had had history on his side. His work ethics was great, but his heroics in game-six against Calgary in 2004 were undermined by Bertuzzi’s suspension and Naslunds no-show in the series. The sensitive Swede and the primal-ape from Sudbury with the soft-hands were always over-shadowing Morrison’s contributions.

At one point the NHL’s leading iron man, Morrison has run into injury trouble the past few years and at the ripe age of 35 he has become expendable. In the age of salary cap and building a team from the middle out, the diminutive forwards prospects are slipping. Once guaranteed a job centering either the first or second line on any NHL team, Morrison has been squeezed out by a new crop of rookies and the new economics of professional hockey which has become a sport in and of itself.

Now he is back in Vancouver. Fighting for a roster spot on a professional tryout. Herded like chattel, waiting to hear about his future. Morrison, the consummate hockey statesmen has the opportunity to do what neither Bertuzzi or Naslund had the balls to do. He has a chance to lead Vancouver to a Stanley Cup.

If he makes the team, and I think he should. It could be akin to Teemu Selanne rejoining the Anaheim Ducks the season they won the Cup. The Canucks have everything they need to a win it all. But they need an X-factor now. A certain je ne said quoi? Something to puts them over the edge. It is in the opinion of this humble correspondent that that very well could be Brendan Morrison.

If the Canucks let him.