Canucks pay a heavy price in thrashing win over Avalanche

Vancouver thrashed the Colorado Avalanche 6-0 thanks to a Daniel Sedin hat-trick on Tuesday, but the victory came at a cost with goaltender Roberto Luongo and winger David Booth suffering injuries. Booth was helped off the ice in the first period following a knee-on-knee collision with Colorado's Kevin Porter and he was to have an MRI scan yesterday. Luongo, who had made just two appearances since returning from an upper-body injury, took a slap shot underneath his chin and left in the second period having made 13 saves. "Just had trouble breathing for a few seconds and felt fine afterward," Luongo told reporters. "I just didn't feel like myself for a little while. That's why we got the closer in there." The Canucks (16-10-1) were 1-0 up when their goaltender went down, but extended the lead with a goal in the second period before routing Colorado in the third with four more to capture their seventh win in eight games. Sedin netted the opening score in the first, then tallied two more in the third to give him 12 goals for the season. Jannik Hansen made a wrist shot in the second and added another one in the third where Alexander Edler also got in on the action with a power-play conversion. "When we play our best we're going to be in games. It doesn't matter who is in the lineup," Sedin told reporters. "We're a deep team so we can have a few injuries." Cory Schneider came on in place of Luongo and made 20 saves to preserve a shutout that snapped Colorado's (13-14-1) three-game winning streak. Meanwhile, NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman says there is not enough data yet to draw conclusions about the link between concussions and a degenerative brain ailment that has been found in four dead ice hockey players. Ailment The league wrapped up its Board of Governors meetings on Tuesday, a day after The New York Times reported that former New York Rangers enforcer Derek Boogaard suffered from chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), an ailment related to Alzheimer's disease. The 28-year-old Boogaard, who died in May of an accidental overdose of alcohol and oxycodone, was found to have had CTE — which can be diagnosed only after the death of the patient. Boogaard is the fourth former NHL player found to have CTE by Boston University's Centre for the Study of Traumatic Encephalopathy. "They're still looking at a very limited database," Bettman said. "There's no control element because you have to look at everything that went on in a person's life before you can make a judgment as to what a brain may show when you open it up. ... There are no easy answers yet." RESULTS -    New Jersey 3 TORONTO 2 -    NY ISLANDERS 5 Tampa Bay 1 -    Columbus 3 MONTREAL 2 -    ST. LOUIS 3 Detroit 2 -    Phoenix 3 NASHVILLE 2 -    WINNIPEG 2 Boston 1 -    CALGARY 7 Carolina 6 -    VANCOUVER 6 Colorado 0 -    ANAHEIM 3 Los Angeles 2 -    Minnesota 2 SAN JOSE 1 -    home team in CAPS