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Sedins help Canucks rally past Coyotes

Feb 13, 2009 - 5:51 AM GLENDALE, Arizona (Ticker) -- The Sedin twins made certain the Vancouver Canucks continued in the right direction.

Henrik Sedin scored a power-play goal to snap a tie midway through the third period as the Canucks scored three times in the session to rally to a 4-3 triumph over the Phoenix Coyotes on Thursday.

Pavol Demitra and defensemen Alex Edler and Mattias Ohlund also tallied for Vancouver, which posted its season-high fourth straight victory after a campaign-worst eight-game losing streak (0-5-3).

Daniel Sedin and blue-liners Kevin Bieksa and Sami Salo each notched two assists and captain Roberto Luongo turned aside 25 shots for the Canucks.

"We went through a tough stretch, and usually when you come out of those, if you can build on it, it makes you a better group," Vancouver coach Alain Vigneault said. "Hopefully, that will happen with us."

"We have won four in a row and are feeling pretty good about ourselves," Luongo said. "We feel no matter what the score is, we still feel we can win. No matter if we are down or up, we have that confidence."

Steven Reinprecht and defenseman Derek Morris netted a power-play goal apiece and Enver Lisin also scored for Phoenix, which fell to 1-7-0 in its last eight games.

"The third period, we sat back and we lost a couple of draws, but that is the result of sitting back," Morris said. "There was a five-minute stretch where we weren't very good, and that was the difference in the game."

"It (stinks), they had no business beating us today," Coyotes defenseman Ed Jovanovski said.

One day after stopping all 33 shots he faced in a 1-0 victory over the Dallas Stars, Ilya Bryzgalov made 28 saves for the Coyotes.

With Phoenix carrying a 3-1 lead into the third period, Demitra halved the deficit just 2:16 into the session, when his wrist shot from the left faceoff circle beat Bryzgalov.

After Edler leveled the contest just over six minutes later with a blast from just inside the blue line, Henrik Sedin gave Vancouver the lead for good.

Salo's blast did not get through, but Daniel Sedin alertly tapped the loose puck to his unmarked brother on the doorstep. Henrik Sedin slapped the puck into the net for his 10th tally of the campaign.

"Danny (Sedin) saw me and passed it to me at the side of the net," Henrik Sedin said. "I had an empty-netter, so it was pretty easy."

After Lisin and Reinprecht staked the Coyotes to an early two-goal advantage, Ohlund drew the Canucks within one with 2:09 remaining in the second period, unleashing a wrist shot from just inside the blue line that beat Bryzgalov for his fourth goal.

Morris restored the two-goal cushion with 33 seconds left in the session as his blast deflected off Vancouver's Ryan Kesler and past Luongo.

"The differences in the first two periods were two things," Vigneault said. "We were not good on draws, especially our top two lines. They were chasing the puck all the time.

"The other thing is, we couldn't get a lot of shots through. We had the puck in their zone for quite a bit and had 19 missed or blocked shots. They were doing a great job of keeping us outside, but in the third, we found a way of getting those shots through and jumped on the rebounds and made a game out of it."

Phoenix coach Wayne Gretzky did not like what he saw in the third period.

"It was a combination of they came out harder (in the third) and we got on our heels," Gretzky said. "I don't know if last night's game had an effect because the first two (periods) were pretty physical. The difference was, we lost three faceoffs that led to three goals, simple as that.

"This one hurt because a win would have gotten us right in the middle of the mix. (A 3-1 lead) with 20 minutes left, their big guys stepped it up. The Sedins and Demitra really went to another level, and we didn't answer that. This loss really hurts."