Canucks Loss Plus Airline Strike Has Canada Reeling, and for Vancouver Writer, Stanley Cup Final Means War

Between the Canucks losing Game 6 of the Stanley Cup Final and Air Canada going on strike Tuesday morning, civilization hasn’t completely ground to a halt up north. But judging by some of the photos from Vancouver’s streets, such a scenario doesn’t seem so far-fetched.

Dazed, zombie-like Canucks fans wandered off litter-strewn West Georgia, where they watched the Bruins’ 5-2 victory Monday, as though they were leaving the site of a nuclear event. Vancouver Sun columnist Douglas Todd even wrote that the series, like war, had brought the people of Canada together.

“Nothing creates solidarity like a war,” Todd wrote. “And that’s what’s been happening with this Stanley Cup run: The Canucks have given us a common enemy.”

While writing about war in Canada might seem like writing about public education in Mississippi — they try hard, but don’t really have a great track record on the topic — the airline strike puts a damper on that theory. Who ever heard of a labor strike in wartime?

Game 7 will be big, but it’s not war, and the outcome won’t leave the losing city destroyed, as war would. Still, those Canucks fans look pretty shell-shocked, don’t they?

PHOTO OF THE DAY

How did you feel watching the dejected Canucks after the Game 6 loss? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.

Photo from Vancouver Sun

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“No, I’m not gonna go there.”
—Tim Thomas, responding to a question about whether he would have stopped Brad Marchand’s goal against Robert Luongo

TWEET OF THE DAY

Believe it or not, Stanley Cup Final games don’t matter, according to Canucks coach Alain Vigneault.

VIDEO OF THE DAY

Dwight Howard, visiting Germany, performed the traditional “Haka” of New Zealand as part of Adidas’ European tour. Apparently New Zealand traditions are big in Deutschland.