It was already a busy day in the NHL with a major trade, as the Ducks told Jacob Trouba welcome to Anaheim and the Rangers told Urho Vaakanainen welcome to New York.
It was a busy day in Vancouver too, with the stadium district packed with people going not only to the Vancouver Canucks’ game against the Columbus Blue Jackets but also attending some sort of concert happening next door. As the last great American dynasty entertained the masses at BC Place, the Canucks tried to do the same at Rogers Arena.
At first, it looked like it was going to be death by a thousand cuts for the Canucks. The Blue Jackets seemed to have the puck on an invisible string in the first period, out-shooting the Canucks by a shocking 17-to-2 margin.
Every single home game, the Canucks are asked, “Are you ready for it?” and every single time, the answer seems to be, “No.”
“It was a tough first period,” said head coach Rick Tocchet. “We just didn’t manage the game. A lot of turnovers…You can’t do that because it’s tough to come back in this league.”
Apparently, it’s not that hard to come back. Whatever was said in the first intermission seemed to land, as the Canucks completely turned the game around. Someone probably said, “Soon you’ll get better” and it turned out to be the prophecy they needed to get their game back on track.
“It was Huggy,” said Tocchet, referring, of course, to Quinn Hughes. “I went in and I could tell Huggy had it. They didn’t need me to scream and yell. They had it. There’s a time and place for [yelling] but I knew when he looked at me, it was like, ‘Hey, we got it.’ That’s a good thing from my captain — our captain.”
Sometimes, you just let your captain be your captain, while you sit on the bleachers, perhaps while wearing a t-shirt and sneakers.
“It’s time to wake up and let’s get going,” said Kiefer Sherwood when asked what the message was in the intermission. “We’ve got to get our work boots on.”
The Canucks were awake and their work boots were stomping for the rest of the game but they weren’t out of the woods yet. A lot still could have gone against them and prevented them from climbing back into this game.
I discovered the answer to the question, “How did it end?” when I watched this game.
- Like Teddy Blueger’s moustache, the Canucks failed to show up in the first period. I’m not going to lie, I’m heartbroken that Blueger shaved off his moustache, which looked fantastic on him. It’s tough when Movember ends and we go back to December.
- Kent Johnson should’ve opened the scoring for the Blue Jackets just over a minute into the game, as he found himself with the puck on his stick facing a wide-open net but he launched the puck right over that open net. My guess? His stick is haunted.
- Honestly, it’s a good thing for the Canucks that Blue Jackets were on the second half of back-to-backs and lost their legs as they game went on. They seemed to struggle with the Blue Jackets’ speed, which is troubling because there are teams who are just as fast as the Blue Jackets and have more skill to go with it. They need to figure out how to counter that style of play.
- Cole Sillinger made a sick pass against the grain from behind the net to Mathieu Olivier to catch Kevin Lankinen looking the wrong way. Erik Brännström could have checked Olivier but, like Macavity, he wasn’t there. There was a blank space in the net and Olivier filled it with the puck.
- There were a bunch of 4-on-4 situations in this game as the referees called several coincidental minors. With more space to maneuver at 4-on-4, Damon Severson had plenty of room to fly down the right wing with Brock Boeser in not-so-fast pursuit. “You’re on your own, kid,” Boeser probably said to Lankinen before Severson blasted a slap shot past the goaltender.
- The Canucks were down bad after the first period but not as bad as they could have been. They were out-shot 17-to-2 and were the lucky ones to only be down 2-0 on the scoreboard.
- The second period started poorly for both Elias Pettersson and Ivan Provorov. Pettersson ended up in the penalty box for tripping Provorov, while Provorov appeared to break his thumb when he fell to the ice. “Look what you made me do,” Provorov probably said to Pettersson as he cradled his crooked thumb on his way back to the bench.
- After his penalty, Pettersson was fresh out the slammer when he started to tilt the momentum in the Canucks' favour with a strong shift. After helping set up one chance for Conor Garland, he challenged Elvis Merzlikins with a dangerous-looking wraparound that led to an offensive zone faceoff. He then won the faceoff that led to the Canucks’ first goal.
- Quinn Hughes going for a skate around the offensive zone is nothing new but it’s still entertaining every time. After Pettersson’s faceoff win, he took a pass from Vincent Desharnais and bolted up the left side and behind the net. He drew all the attention to himself while Boeser found a soft spot in the right faceoff circle where he could one-time Hughes’ pass inside the far post.
- The turning point of the game was a colossal mistake by Blue Jackets goaltender Elvis Merzlikins. Zach Werenski was clearly going to win the race to a puck dumped into the Blue Jackets’ zone but Merzlikins raced out of the net to play the puck. All he had to do was stay in his net, but instead shot the puck right into Teddy Blueger, who smartly passed to Sherwood for a better angle on the open net.
- “I saw Elvis come out of his net and then I just assumed that Teddy was going to somehow get the puck,” said Sherwood, adding, “He had great composure. In that [situation], sometimes you want to rush things but he protected it after he got it. I was just kind of lucky it went in.”
- Hughes only had two assists — only! — but he was the mastermind of the whole comeback. He was on the ice for all five Canucks goals and was orchestrating everything with some fantastic defensive plays, quick breakouts, and usual brilliance in the offensive zone. He came millimeters from scoring the game-winning goal in the first minute of the third period when he used some slick skating to open up a shooting lane, only to hit the underside of the crossbar.
- Instead, Pius Suter scored what proved to be the game-winner with his 10th goal of the season. Conor Garland picked off a pass along the boards, fought off Jordan Harris behind the net, then centred for Suter, who had subtly slipped into the slot. Merzlikins got a piece of Suter’s shot but the net beckoned to the puck to join her in an illicit affair and the puck couldn’t resist saying, “For you, I would cross the line.”
- “[Suter] has worked on his shot, especially at the start of the year,” said Tocchet. “I don’t know what line I had him on but I remember he came in and — he wasn’t complaining — he just said, ‘What can I do to get better?’ We talked about his practice, he was staying on and shooting a lot of pucks. I feel that’s really helped him because his shot has really improved from last year and he gets it off quicker.”
- Midway through the third period, it seemed like the gold rush was on, as the Canucks poured on the pressure seeking a fourth goal. Brock Boeser was robbed twice by Merzlikins, while Pettersson had a wide open net at the top of the crease from a nifty play by Jake DeBrusk, only for Damon Severson’s skate to suddenly get bigger than the whole sky to block the shot.
- A goal seemed inevitable but the Canucks scored it in an utterly bizarre way after so many grade-A chances. Quinn Hughes loaded up a one-timer but broke his stick, sending the puck drifting toward the net in a seemingly harmless fashion. But the shot wasn’t untouchable and DeBrusk gave it a deft touch to make it significantly less harmless, sending it through Merzlikin’s legs for the insurance goal.
- Conor Garland may be the smallest man who ever lived but he’s a big-time agitator. The TV replays didn’t quite capture it but Garland got under Justin Danforth’s skin by condescendingly patting him on the back after the Blue Jackets forward hit him, saying something along the lines of, “Good job buddy.” He got the reaction he wanted, as Danforth shoved him multiple times while Garland laughed, probably saying, “Come on, who’s afraid of little old me?”
- The Canucks added one more goal into the empty net before the night was done. Hughes pressured the puck on the boards to force a bad pass that Pettersson picked off. Instead of trying to force a shot on the empty net from the defensive zone, Pettersson smartly found Pius Suter breaking up ice, giving him an easy finish from the neutral zone to put even more daylight between the two teams.
- While the comeback was impressive, the Canucks absolutely have to sort out their first-period struggles. Getting outshot 17-to-2, especially on home ice, is ugly. Fortunately, Lankinen came up big, making 30 saves on 32 shots, including 15 in the first period alone. Honestly, it might be tough for the Canucks to decide between who to start on any given night between Lankinen and the returning Thatcher Demko but that’s what we might call champagne problems.
- Look, I know I did something bad by overdoing all the Taylor Swift references but don’t blame me. This is me trying to have a little fun before I head out of Rogers Arena into a horde of Swifties also trying to take the SkyTrain home because I don’t have a getaway car. ‘Tis the damn season for Taylor Swift references, after all, and you knew all too well what you were in for when you came to Pass it to Bulis. So, thanks for reading: I’m only me when I’m with you.
