Alex Burrows’ overtime goal exorcises the demons, Vancouver finally beats Chicago

Tonight ran the gamut of possibilities and drama and all of it centered around Canucks forward Alex Burrows. Burrows rode the roller coaster of possibilities before ultimately ending up the Canucks’ big hero scoring his second goal of the game in overtime to give Vancouver a Game 7 win 2-1 over their tormentors from Chicago, finally beating them in a best of seven series in their third try in three years.

Burrows’ night started off quickly getting the Canucks on the board just under three minutes into the game giving Vancouver a 1-0 lead. Burrows would get a chance early in the third period to give Vancouver a 2-0 lead when he was awarded a penalty shot after being hooked on a breakaway. On his attempt, however, Corey Crawford (36 saves) would stop Burrows to preserve the score at 1-0.

That stop would factor huge later on in the game with the Canucks on the power play, Burrows turned the puck over leading to a Chicago rush down ice that ultimately turned into a shorthanded goal by Blackhawks captain Jonathan Toews to tie the game up.

With the game headed to overtime, the spotlight wouldn’t leave Burrows as he was sent to the box for holding Duncan Keith early in OT. Penalties in overtime are rare but the Canucks withstood the onslaught of shots and saw one tremendous save from Roberto Luongo (31 saves in all) to rally the fans and the team.

With the penalty killed, Vancouver took advantage of a turnover from Chris Campoli and Burrows got his shot to end it and did so ripping one past Crawford over his shoulder and into the net to seal the game.

Summing up Burrows’ night it went like this: Hero, goat, super goat, potential pariah, King of the World if that world was made up of Canucks fans.

With Vancouver wrapping up the series, they’ll now face Nashville in the second round. By virtue of the Canucks win, it also sets up a San Jose-Detroit second round rematch as well. There’s a couple ways things could go for Vancouver now that they’ve gotten the Chicago monkey off their back. They could either rally from this and roll through the playoffs or they’ll get the fight of their lives from every team standing in front of them.

Nashville is no pushover and if the Canucks thought Chicago was physical with them, there’s an angry former Canuck in Shane O’Brien frothing at the mouth to get shots at his former team, not to mention everyone else in Nashville that loves to throw a hit. If they’re able to get past them, then either San Jose or Detroit awaits. Vancouver  might be celebrating this win with some gusto, but this is just the start for them. They’ll either come out of this Chicago series wiser for the wear or get ushered out in the near future.