VANCOUVER — For a city that can feel like the wettest place on Earth sometimes — typically only every November through February — Vancouver once went 58 days without rain. Incredible, but true, we think.
Google says it occurred in 1951 and, lest anyone on the West Coast back then became smug or overly tanned, Mother Nature then unleashed 46 straight days of rain the following winter.
We’re guessing one drought was more enjoyable than the other.
Eventually, surely, the Vancouver Canucks will bask in fine weather. But not these days, when even as the sun shines uncharacteristically almost daily here through October, it is only raining inside the hockey rink.
On Thursday, almost inconceivably, the struggling, rebuilding team went 39 minutes and 14 seconds without a shot on goal in a 5-2 home loss to the Detroit Red Wings, a middling National Hockey League team with a middling defensive rank (16th in the league with 27 shots against per game).
Even for a franchise partly known for its 56-year Stanley Cup drought, the Canucks’ remarkable shot famine on Thursday will probably linger long in memory. It may show up on Google 75 years from now.
From Elias Pettersson’s power-play goal at 7:02 of the first period until Jake DeBrusk’s shooting-for-a-rebound effort from the right-wing circle at 6:16 of the third, the Canucks did not force either of Detroit’s goalies to make a save.
Red Wings starter John Gibson apparently got something in his eye — it wasn’t the puck — which allowed minor-league call-up Michal Postava to make his NHL debut in the third period. DeBrusk’s shot in the 47th minute was Vancouver’s sixth of the game.
It drew a robust cheer from the home crowd, as did subsequent rapid-fire shots by Zeev Buium and Brock Boeser.
Could players hear the sarcastic eruptions?
“Yes,” Boeser said.
And how did it feel?
“Embarrassing.”
Postava, a 22-year-old Czech whose day began in the minors, had a different interpretation.
“I just get in my mind like they're cheering for me,” he told reporters.
“It’s well-deserved for us,” Canuck Drew O’Connor said of the cutting cheers. “We didn’t give them anything to cheer for.”
This was the Canucks’ ninth straight defeat, but the most disappointing yet considering the Red Wings scored on three of the first five shots on Kevin Lankinen, essentially clinching the victory nine minutes in, while Vancouver generated only five shots in 46 minutes. This was about effort.
Until an eight-shot frenzy by the Canucks in the final period, Linus Karlsson’s sharp-angle backhand in the final minute of the second period threatened to become a talking point; it was initially recorded as a shot (and save by Gibson) but was quickly taken off the scoreboard by the NHL’s heartless off-ice officials.
“No, it was wide,” Karlsson said. “I should probably just curl up there, find another play. But we had zero shots, and I was just thinking, like, try to throw it to the net to create something.”
Vancouver created so little that Marco Rossi’s speedy dash through the Detroit zone to beautifully set up Jonathan Lekkerimaki at 10:37 of the final period stood out as something close to magnificent.
“I think there’s a lot of things missing in our game,” Rossi told Sportsnet after returning to the lineup from a two-game absence due to illness. “I feel like we're just chasing the puck the whole game, and we're not making any plays out there. And, I mean, it's the best league in the world, right? If we continue playing like this, it's going to be a long season.
“Nothing is going on in the offensive zone and in the defensive zone, I mean, we're giving up so many chances.”
Rossi said he felt badly for Lankinen, who faced 31 shots but was under a lot more pressure than that due to swaths of the game played entirely in Vancouver’s zone.
“We're letting all of us down, right?” he continued. “It's not just Lanks. I mean, everyone, and it's a feeling that sucks, you know? We can't just always talk, talk, talk; we’ve got to do it and just play the game the right way. We’re all good players. We play here for a reason, right? We’ve got to show it.”
The Red Wings, who have points in six straight games, got a pair of early goals from Lucas Raymond, and others from William Wallinder, Michael Rasmussen and Emmitt Finnie. On four of the goals, the Wings simply outnumbered, overpowered or out-positioned Canuck defenders in front of Lankinen.
Vancouver got almost nothing to the Detroit net.
“It’s easy to go to the net if you have the puck in the offensive zone,” Karlsson explained. “Like, it's hard if you don't have the puck. So we need to start to have the puck in the O-zone. I think that's the problem.”
Asked about the message in the dressing room during the second intermission, after the Canucks’ first shot-less period in nearly a decade, Karlsson said: “We keep talking about compete, winning board battles, winning 50/50s. We know the tactics, the structure. So, I mean, it's up to us. We need to stop talking about it and start doing it.”
The Canucks, now 2-9-1 and last in the NHL in points percentage (20.8) and goal-differential (minus 21), haven’t won since Oct. 3.
“The effort level was a little disappointing tonight,” coach Manny Malhotra said. “A lot of effort-based things that just weren’t there.
“There has to be a level of concern by the players to know that it’s not good enough, and it’s only going to get harder. And the identity we have as a team is very much a reflection of their attitude and what they’re putting forth.”
And what they aren’t.
