Vancouver Canucks

The Vancouver Canucks are a professional ice hockey team based in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. They are members of the Northwest Division of the Western Conference of the National Hockey League (NHL). They play their home games at General Motors Place, which has a capacity of 18,810.

The Canucks joined the league in 1970 as an expansion team along with the Buffalo Sabres (the 13th and 14th teams to join). In its NHL history, the team has advanced twice to the Stanley Cup Finals but lost both times (to the New York Islanders in 1982 and the New York Rangers in 1994).

The Vancouver Canucks' mascot is an anthropomorphic killer whale (orca) named Fin Orca or Fin the Whale. He is often seen banging a First Nations drum, or skating around during intermission firing t-shirts out of the Boston Pizza compressed air cannon. On occasion, smoke also comes out of the "blowhole" on his head. Fin has his trademarked "chomping" where he "bites" the heads of fans.

There have been 12 Canucks players who have served as the captain. The franchise's first captain was Orland Kurtenbach, who captained the team until his retirement in 1974.The longest-tenured Canucks captain was Stan Smyl, who was appointed for eight seasons. Smyl is also the only Canucks captain to have spent his entire NHL playing career with the team. Trevor Linden, who captained from 1990 to 1997, played 16 seasons with the Canucks, a franchise high. Swedish Markus Naslund, who captained for seven seasons, is the only non-Canadian to have captained the Canucks. Though goaltenders are not permitted to act as captains during games, Roberto Luongo has served as the captain since 2008, but because of the NHL rule against goaltender captains, the league does not allow Luongo to serve as captain on-ice. In his place, the three alternate captains are responsible for dealing with officials during games. They will also handle ceremonial faceoffs. Luongo is not permitted to wear the "C" on his jersey, but it was incorporated into the artwork on the front of one of his masks.



Vancouver Canucks Official Website[www.canucks.com]
NHL Official Website[www.nhl.com]
NHL PC Game Modules[www.thebreakaway.net]