| abstract
| - The 1994–95 Vancouver Canucks season was the Canucks' 25th NHL season. Goaltender Kirk McLean accounted for all of the Canucks' 18 wins. Pavel Bure did not have the same power he did in 1992-93 and 1993-94, the two seasons in which he reached the 60-goal mark, but he still led the club in 1994-95 in goals (20) and shots (198). A trade with the Dallas Stars on April 7, 1995 saw the Russ Courtnall join his brother Geoff on the same team. The Canucks finished the season at .500 for 6th place in the Western Conference and led the NHL with 12 ties. In the playoffs, Vancouver was the clear underdog against the 3rd-place St. Louis Blues, who had members from the 1994 Stanley-Cup champion Ranger team and former Rangers head coach Mike Keenan. After losing game 1 at the Kiel Center by a score of 2-1, the Canucks won game 2 by a score of 5-3 behind Kirk McLean's 33-save performance and Pavel Bure's shorthanded insurance goal in the third period. The shots on goal were 26 for Vancouver and 36 for St. Louis, as they had been in game 1. The Canucks carried over their momentum from their win in game 2 to the Pacific Coliseum for game 3, which they won 6-1. Sergio Momesso scored twice. The Canucks were looking to win game 4 as well, leading 2-1 after Russ Courtnall's shorthanded goal ot 4:41 of the second period. But the Blues got their jump from Brendan Shanahan who scored a natural hat trick to give the Blues a 4-2 lead. Glenn Anderson would add another goal at 13:01 of the third period as St. Louis went on to win 5-2 to square the series at 2 games apiece. In game 5 at the Kiel Center, the Canucks scored 4 times on their first 19 shots, as Curtis Joseph would be pulled in favor of Jon Casey. Trailing Vancouver 5-4 with under 12 minutes to play, Murray Baron tied the game at 8:22 of the third period. The game would go into overtime where Cliff Ronning scored at 1:48 of the first overtime period to give the Canucks a 3-2 lead in the series. Looking to close out the series at home in game 6, the Canucks were dominated by the Blues who won by a score of 8-2. Esa Tikkanen picked up 4 points in the game (2 goals, 2 assists). Kirk McLean allowed 6 goals on just 17 shots. With the series tied at 3-3, a crucial game 7 in St. Louis took place on Friday, May 19. Although the Blues had twice as many shots as the Canucks (44-22), Curtis Joseph allowed 4 goals on 21 shots while Kirk McLean made 41 saves. Pavel Bure added an empty-net goal with 22 seconds remaining to seal the game 5-3 and give the Canucks a 4-3 series win. It was Bure's 7th goal of the playoffs. It was a highly offensive series, as each team scored 27 goals over the 7 games. The Canucks' soecial teams dominated throughout, as Vancouver scored 11 power-play goals and 6 shorthanded goals in the series. In the second round, the Canucks faced the Chicago Blackhawks. Both teams skated to a 1-1 tie before Joe Murphy scored the winner at 9:04 of the first overtime period. Blackhawks goaltender Ed Belfour stopped 26 of 27 Vancouver shots. Game 2 was also close, as Chicago edged Vancouver 2-0 on goals by Jim Cummins and Patrick Poulin. Down 2 games to none in the series, the Canucks battled desperately to get a win at home in game 3 but relinquished leads of 1-0 and 2-1. Ironically it was ex-Canuck Murray Craven who tied the game at 2-2 with 45 seconds remaining in the third period to send the game to overtime. Chris Chelios scored at 6:22 of the first overtime period as the Hawks took a commanding 3 games to none series lead. In game 4, Vancouver broke a 1-1 tie on two goals by Roman Oksiuta to lead 3-1 in the second period, but Chicago came back again on goals by Gerald Diduck and Jeremy Roenick, and so the score after 60 minutes was 3-3. Once again, the overtime hero was Chris Chelios who scored 5:35 into the extra frame to give the Blackhawks a 4-0 sweep over the Canucks and advance to the third round for the first time in three years. __TOC__
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