VANCOUVER – The offence-starved Vancouver Canucks pumped five goals on home ice past Carey Price on Tuesday and still lost to the Montreal Canadiens by two.
It’s not forward Brock Boeser the Canucks need most, it’s goalie Roberto Luongo. A couple of defencemen like Mattias Ohlund and Ed Jovanovski wouldn’t hurt, either.
The Canucks’ 7-5 loss to the Canadiens actually represented a far better effort than Vancouver showed in 7-1 and 6-1 losses the last week against the Nashville Predators and Calgary Flames, but their goaltending and defensive play aren’t giving them a hope of winning.
The Canucks have surrendered 36 goals in the seven games they’ve played since top centre Bo Horvat left the lineup with a broken foot on Dec. 5. No wonder the team is 1-6 since then and base jumping towards the bottom of the National Hockey League’s Western Conference standings.
Canucks goalie Anders Nilsson, who appears to be duelling with Jacob Markstrom to see who’s No. 2, was beaten six times on 31 shots by the Canadiens.
Yes, there were another pile of outnumbered rushes presented by the Canucks, but that kind of save rate (.806) doesn’t win anything. It doesn’t keep you in professional hockey if it persists for long.
The Canucks wasted a hat trick by Thomas Vanek and the mental boost – and another goal – generated by the return of fan-favourite Boeser after the 20-year-old rookie left the ice injured two nights earlier.
Six goals against, plus an empty-netter? A touchdown for the Canadiens? Teams haven’t won games like that since the 1980s.
"I think it’s been frustrating for the whole team," Nilsson said. "None of us, myself included, has been playing at our best level. I think everyone in this room knows they can play better and everyone needs to play better. I think tonight, team-wise, it was a step forward. Obviously, we can get better."
It was a step forward offensively, two steps backward without the puck.
Grinder Nicolas Deslauriers led the Canadiens with a pair of goals. Fourteen of Montreal’s 18 skaters collected at least a point to help rescue Price, who was barely recognizable as a world-class netminder.
"We gave up too many goals," Vanek said. "You deserve a point when you get five goals against Carey. But… they’re quick on those outnumbered rushes. We’ve got to eliminate those. The good news is I think our effort was a lot better. But we’ve still got to clean up defensively."
And what a major cleanup it has to be.
"I feel like we’re giving up quite a few outnumbered rushes," Vancouver defenceman Derrick Pouliot said. "Teams are flying the zone with their forwards and getting behind our backcheck. When you give up I-don’t-know-how-many outnumbered rushes a game, those are quality chances. In this league, the forwards are good and make plays and, as you can see, they convert on those chances."
Nilsson allowed two long-range goals in the final three minutes of the second period. On one, he looked awful. The other, suspect. The Canucks never recovered.
Deslauriers, who had one goal in 14 games before Tuesday, scored his second of the night to break a 2-2 tie at 17:05 of the middle frame as Nilsson stumbled getting across his goalmouth and let a low, unscreened one-timer from about 45 feet go under him.
The Canucks were able to tie it again only 34 seconds later when Vanek’s pass caromed to Daniel Sedin at the side of the net after Price slid aggressively in the opposite direction.
But Vancouver defenceman Alex Biega took a cross-checking penalty at 19:09 and only four seconds after the faceoff, Jeff Petry’s point shot beat Nilsson short side.
The netminder’s best period of the last two weeks was his 18-save mop-up for Markstrom in the final 20 minutes Sunday, which began with the Flames already leading the Canucks 5-1.
He began the third period Tuesday be beaching himself stage left on a Montreal three-on-two, and was utterly unable to move back to his right before Paul Byron had time and space to score from a sharp angle into the open net as Montreal went ahead 5-3 at 1:37.
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In five starts over the last three weeks, Nilsson has allowed 24 goals on 181 shots. That’s a save percentage of .867. His save rate for the season, which was an unsustainable .942 after Nilsson’s first five starts, is down to .906.
Markstrom has been equally ventilated recently. In his four starts since Horvat’s injury created the turning point in the Canucks’ season, Markstrom has a ghastly save percentage of .848 and a goals-against average of 4.29.
His save percentage for the season, which peaked at .919, is down to .907. The NHL average – all goalies, not just starters – is .912. And the Canucks aren’t good enough to win with average goaltending.
There was a lively debate for most of the fall about whether Nilsson or Markstrom deserved to be the No. 1 goalie. Right now, neither does.
The Canucks have been a disaster in front of them at times the last two weeks. Considering the scoring chances surrendered, Vancouver would have needed a six-by-four sheet of plywood to beat Nashville and Calgary.
But real starting goalies are supposed to make a difference. It’s not good enough simply to float like a cork on the current, being carried whichever way the team is going. Markstrom and Nilsson know this.
"I wouldn’t blame the players in front of me," Nilsson said. "Me, personally, I always go to myself after every goal. I’m pretty critical of myself. Almost on every goal, I think I can do something different."
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