VANCOUVER — This should have been a constructive week for the Vancouver Canucks. A reset. Instead, they returned to regular programming.
Staggering through a hectic and historically bad first quarter of the National Hockey League season, the Canucks finally got a chance to rest and practise.
But only the resting part was evident Friday against the New York Rangers. The Canucks rested in the second period, surrendering as many goals as they generated shots (four) and were embarrassed again in a 5-1 loss, their 17th defeat in 18 games since Oct. 3 and their eighth straight loss at Rogers Arena.
It sounds impossible that in the Year 2026, with the experienced National Hockey League players the Canucks have kept on their roster for the start of the Great Rebuild, the team could be this bad.
But despite underlying numbers and common sense that suggest Vancouver should have another three or four wins, they actually are this bad — and will continue to be this bad — as long as they go missing for large swaths of games.
“The story of the second (period) was just our unwillingness or inability to stick to the script,” Canucks head coach Manny Malhotra said. “Our first period was probably the best we've looked in a long time, just in terms of everything structurally. Coming back to that mindset of simple and direct works for us. And in the second period, it was just... turnover after turnover after turnover that feeds transition and doesn't allow us to do the things that make us competitive.”
The Canucks did indeed have an excellent opening period against a good Rangers team and led 1-0 on Elias Pettersson’s deflection until Gabe Perreault was left open in the low slot behind defenceman Filip Hronek and slung the puck through a tiny gap over goalie Leevi Merilainen’s shoulder at 18:47.
Shots were 11-10 for Vancouver. And then in the second period, they were 12-4 for the Rangers, who were not made to earn their goals.
Vancouver penalty killers left open a seam as wide as the Great Rift Valley for ex-Canuck J.T. Miller to feather a pass in front to Oliver Bjorkstrand to convert for a 2-1 New York lead at 8:21.
Attempting to make his own breakout pass, goalie Merilainen pegged the puck off teammate Filip Chytil in the Canucks' slot, allowing Richmond, B.C., native Glenn Gawdin to score his first NHL goal at the 13-minute mark.
Then, after the Canucks' Brendan Gallagher lost the puck on a rush at the Rangers’ blueline when his teammates were desperate for a change, New York counter-attacked three-on-two without the hindrance of a Vancouver backcheck and tic-tac-toed the puck to Alexis Lafreniere to make it 4-1 at 15:16.
New Canuck Cameron Crotty then turned over the puck in the neutral zone, keying another Rangers’ transition that turned into Gawdin’s second career goal on a deflection at 16:10.
“Even as good as we were in the first, we were even worse in the second,” veteran Canuck Drew O’Connor said. “I mean, it's very frustrating. It's why we're not winning games.”
The Rangers scored four goals on six shots in less than eight minutes. Where did the Canucks go?
They reappeared for the third period and outshot New York 13-8 when it hardly mattered. But where were they when the game was being decided in the second?
These mid-game disappearances (unless they’ve been at the start of games or near the end) have been a serial problem for the Canucks.
But this latest leave of absence occurred at the end of what should have been a re-energizing week, a constructive week, when two full practices and a day off preceded the Rangers’ visit at the end of New York’s four-game road trip.
It also came one day after Canucks co-presidents Daniel and Henrik Sedin, modelling accountability after the 3-16-1 team matched the worst 20-game points percentage in the NHL in 20 years, held a press conference to answer questions and absorb heat.
“We need consistent effort throughout for 60 minutes,” Daniel said halfway through Thursday’s press conference. “That's the bottom line, and that's been very hard for us to do this year. We see 25 minutes, we see 35 minutes, and we're making mistakes within the structure that's costing us games. And we need to get that out of our game.”
The second period of Friday’s game was filled with those mistakes. Subsequently, so was the Canucks’ net filled with pucks.
“We just haven't played a full game together,” senior Canuck Brock Boeser said after Game 21. “We talk about it and we talk about it, and it's the same stuff. So we're going to have to learn eventually.”
Boeser continued: “You see the best teams in the league; they continue to play the same way. There's times you can make a play, and there's times that you can't. And you’ve got to learn when those times are.”
“Just the ability to stay on task, that in itself is demanding,” Malhotra said. “And when you look at really good teams in this league, they don't shoot themselves in the foot, and they just stay with their process. They stay with their game plan, and eventually somebody cracks. And too many times, we're the team that goes off script and cracks.”
ICE CHIPS — Pettersson’s goal was his first at even-strength this season. Boeser’s assist was his 500th NHL point, all of them with the Canucks... Crotty, the defenceman claimed on waivers this week from the Minnesota Wild, had a solid debut for the Canucks despite his turnover on the Rangers’ final goal. He was minus-one in 12:18 of ice time and posted expected-goals-for of 50 per cent at five-on-five... Defenceman Tom Willander and centre Filip Chytil returned to the Vancouver lineup from injuries after missing four games and five games, respectively... Chytil’s line with Jonathan Lekkerimaki and Paul Cotter got crushed at five-on-five, outshot 8-1 and outscored 2-0 while registering an xGF of seven per cent. Much of their ice time was against J.T. Miller, who finished with two assists and was one of the best Rangers.
