The dream is over. The Canucks will not be the first team in NHL history with a perfect 82-win season. They’ll have to settle for the monumentally less impressive 81-0-1 record and you may as well just throw in the towel and declare the season a complete and utter disaster.
Let’s be honest, though: getting this game to overtime after the Canucks went down 3-0 and got badly outplayed all game? That’s a win. So, from a certain point of view, the Canucks are still undefeated. If the NHL standings are based on the indomitability of the human spirit, the Canucks are at the top of the Western Conference.
Wait, they actually are still at the top of the Western Conference. Huh. I watched this game.
- Like your suitcase after going through additional security screening at the airport, Philip Larsen was a mixed bag. He finished the night with two assists, both on the power play, but also shouldered some of the blame for two of the Kings’ goals. He got caught out of position on the first goal, giving Brayden McNabb far too much room and couldn’t keep Dustin Brown to the outside on the third goal.Â
- Luca Sbisa has polished up his game until it’s shiny, but every once in awhile a scuff mark still peeks through, like when he hit Jeff Carter with a perfect centring pass from behind the net while killing a penalty. Sbisa, the Canucks are paying you $3.6 million per year; you think they have the cap space to sign Jeff Carter? Also, you probably would have seen him in the locker room once or twice if he was on your team.
- Despite the Kings dominating possession, they still only managed 31 shots on goal, and that’s including an overtime power play. It’s the first time this season the Canucks have given up 30+ shots and they had to block 21 shots to keep the total as low as it was. The top pairing of Tanev and Edler combined for more blocks than my one-year-old has, though that’s mainly because his older brothers lost a bunch of them. Tanev and Edler combined for 11 blocks. I guess what I’m saying is my son is block-deprived and will never become an architect or engineer.
- Willie Desjardins switched up the lines heading into this game, which I actually really respect: it’s not too often you see a team on a 4-game winning streak make significant changes, but the coaching staff clearly recognize that improvements need to be made. That said, Sven Baertschi just plain doesn’t work with the Sedins and it’s obvious why: the national animal of Sweden is the elk and bears eat elk.
- Jannik Hansen got the comeback started, which is the least surprising thing I’ve heard since my four-year-old told me the “Interrupting Cow” knock-knock joke that I had just told him five minutes earlier. Hansen got in behind the defence off a devastatingly fantastic bank pass from Brandon Sutter, then kept with the puck after Drew Doughty tied him up and managed to centre for Markus Granlund. Peter Budaj was spinning in his crease like a dog in its bed before a nap, making it easy for Granlund to tap it in.
- The Canucks got within one on the power play before the end of the second period. With the Kings changing, Jacob Markstrom alertly played a quick up to Daniel Sedin. The penalty killers never got back into position, giving Larsen room to put a slap shot on net, creating a rebound for Henrik Sedin, who scored and shouted, “!”
- With just under two minutes remaining in the third period, the Canucks got a power play. With a minute left, they pulled Markstrom for the extra attacker. Ignoring that they scored for just a moment, the Canucks could have had nearly two full minutes of 6-on-4, but Desjardins waited. I really don’t know why.
- Needing a goal in the final minute, Desjardins sent out a defenceman as his extra attacker in place of Markstrom, which is nearly an oxymoron: it’s defenceman not attackman. It, of course, worked. Edler took a pass from Larsen, walked to the top of the faceoff circle, then ripped a shot past Eriksson’s well-placed screen. And also Budaj.
- Sidenote: forwards should totally be called attackmen.
- Markstrom didn’t look great on any of the goals, but he came up big on the penalty kill in overtime, especially in the dying seconds when he made like the first aid attendant on an arctic expedition dealing with a case of frostbite: he made a toe save, stopping a deflected Carter shot.
- Markstrom allowed just one goal in the shootout, failing to close the five-hole in time to stop Tanner Pearson, but the Canucks’ shooters did him no favours. Baertschi, Burrows, and Sutter couldn’t beat Budaj, meaning Markstrom had to be, , perfection.
