MONTREAL - Their records look similar and only one point separates them in the NHL's overall standings, but make no mistake, tonight's Canadiens opponents at the Bell Centre are in a whole other league.
Example?
The Vancouver Canucks will be welcoming defenceman Dan Hamhuis back to the lineup after he missed eight games with a foot injury. After losing the first two games he missed, the Canucks have won six straight.
To make room for Hamhuis, former Habs head coach Alain Vigneault has decided to sit Keith Ballard as a healthy scratch. If Ballard were on the Canadiens, he'd be in their top four, if not top two. But for the Canucks, he's baggage.
That's not entirely fair as Ballard is coming off major hip surgery in the offseason and suffered a concussion last month that cost him five games and, ultimately, his spot in the lineup as the guy who replaced him, Aaron Rome, will play with Hamhuis tonight.
But my point is that this is a stacked team with three very dangerous forward lines, six solid defencemen and a goalie who's not too shabby, even though Roberto Luongo's numbers thus far might suggest otherwise.
The Canadiens will have to deal with problems in waves when you consider that the Canucks third pair duo of Manny Malhotra and Raffi Torres have combined for 10 goals and six assists in their last six games. Even their top pairing on defence, Alexander Edler and Chrsitian Ehrhoff, have 17 points between them.
The Canucks will have no such problems as the Canadiens are still playing a game of Top-6 Idol, with Maxim Lapierre the latest to perform in front of the judges as he gets a shot at playing with Scott Gomez and Andrei Kostitsyn.
This one has the makings of a bloodbath, but as I've noted before, these are often games where the unthinkable happens.
