"Alex Burrows still has the gift of the gab, but those occasional verbal jabs are much further between and his heightened sense of discipline has helped propel the Vancouver Canucks to the top of the NHL.

And even though the Calgary Flames will try to get under the winger's skin on Wednesday at Rogers Arena, don't expect Burrows to take the bait.

Burrows has just 14 penalty minutes after 28 games and is on pace for 41 minutes, a far cry from the 121, 150 and 179 minutes he piled up the previous three seasons.

It has allowed him to turn playmaker instead of a pain in the butt because he's also on pace to break his career assist mark of 32 on a team that's on an incredible 15-1-2 run and looking to stretch its win streak to a season-high seven games.

The Flames are struggling, but have won four of their last five and need to rebound from a 7-2 spanking from the Canucks on Dec. 1 at the Saddledome. In that respect, they have scratched winger Niklas Hagman, who hasn't scored in nine games, and will insert the recalled Michael Backlund.

"They don't like us and we don't like them and I'm sure there is going to be a lot of action," said Burrows. "I still like chirping a bit, but I stay away from the scrums. That stuff hurts our team more than helps. I had talks with management about where we want to be as a team and it would be better for the team if I stayed out of the penalty box more.

"We're staying off the refs more than we used to. We don't give it to them as much and we're more polite. We let them do their job and we focus on our own thing."

That thing is being the league's second-highest scoring team and ranked second on the power play and first in faceoff percentage. For Burrows, staying out of the box has also meant more time to contribute because the Canucks are ranked 12th with just a dozen penalty minutes per outing. It's far cry from previous practices. In the 2009-10 season, the Canucks were ranked 26th (15.5 minutes) and in 2008-09 they were 28th (16.5) and in 2007-08 were 29th (18.1)."