The Bieksa Bounce!

If there are ghosts haunting the San Jose Sharks through their many playoff disappointments, the supernatural presence played a most unkind trick on the Sharks on Tuesday evening.

Despite an offensive output that should have secured a win, a gut check performance from the Sharks injured Captain Joe Thornton and the ever dependable goaltending that the Sharks had come to expect from Antti Niemi, the stars, the spirits or just plain dumb luck played the San Jose Sharks out of the Stanley Cup playoffs for another year.

A Kevin Bieksa goal, off a bizarre bounce from the sideboards proved to be the concluding moment of the double overtime marathon that the Sharks and Canucks played through, a goal that sent the Canuck faithful off into the night in celebration and the devotees of the Sharks (and their management) off to ponder what could have been, once again.

Game Five most likely should have belonged to the Sharks, they showed remarkable resolve, carried for the most part by their captain and their fourth line with an assist or two of note from their goaltender.

Heading into the final half minute of period three, they seemed to be on a path to forcing yet another elimination game on Thursday back home in San Jose. Then, as would seem the case in their history fate would take a twist, this time in the form of a blown icing call and some mastery from the Canucks' brightest lights.

With Roberto Luongo on the bench for an extra attacker in a desperation bid to send the game to OT, the Canucks once again showcased the puck mastery of the Sedins' along with what seems to be the destiny of Ryan Kesler.  With the Sedin's in control of the flow of the final thirty second, the puck found its way to Kesler's stick with but thirteen seconds to go in the period, Kesler who for the majority of the game seemed to be skating on but one leg, took the pass and pushed it past Annti Niemi,  a tying goal to set in motion the drama to come.

The Kesler goal, without which we would be talking about the Canucks inability to close out a series, was just another remarkable play by the Canuck who carried this team through the Nashville series and on to their apparent destiny.

We've said it before from this portal and we'll probably say it again before Lord Stanley's Cup is hoisted high, but win or lose (and from our corner of the hockey universe we'd prefer the win), the Canuck's assistant captain is surely destined for the Conn Smythe trophy for his work this playoff year.

From the take charge days of the Nashville series to his determination to persevere on Tuesday with what seemed like an injured leg that portended a dramatically different outcome, Kesler has been the spark plug when needed most.

The Sedins' have returned to the form that had been anticipated through these playoffs, Kevin Bieksa has been the anchor of the defence through three series and of course fired off the goal to set off celebrations in Vancouver's streets last night and yes, Roberto Luongo has been pretty reliable through the first eighteen games (though not without a few of those what the hell moments thrown in for good measure),

And while there have really been no passengers on this Canucks bus this playoff run, game in and game out it's been Kesler's play that has highlighted the determination of this year's version of the Canucks. His play the definitive example of a player that would/should be a Most Valuable Player of the playoffs.

Of course, there is still a bit of work ahead for Vancouver before we start talking about the hardware.

They await a winner from the Boston/Tampa Bay series, either team will provide more than enough of a challenge to derail the wildest fantasies of those that patrolled down Granville Street in Vancouver or on any downtown street in any town in the province on Tuesday.

Still, this does seem to be a team that doesn't get rattled by much. Fall behind, battle back seems to be the mantra of late.  Make a mistake and someone else will pick up the slack to bring things back to where they should be, with few exceptions this playoff season that has been the rule.

The memories stretch back 17 years in Vancouver, to a seven game series that could have, should have brought a parade to Vancouver.  A very different team takes to that task shortly, rather than underdogs, they'll most likely be considered the favourite, a belief in themselves that no matter what comes their way, at the end a bounce or two will come back to secure their fate.

Bounce one came off the glass and onto Kevin Bieksa's stick, it bounced the Sharks out of the playoffs and sent the Canucks on to the finals, with what Bieksa called an ugly duck of a shot, destiny it seems is peeking over those mountains.

Needless to say, there's much to read about the Double overtime thrills of Game five, you can review a good portion of that and review the path of the Western Final from our archive page for the series which you can find here.