Remember Bo Horvat? I remember.
The Canucks have lost eight of the nine games Horvat has missed with a fractured foot. They’ve been out-scored 44-to-20 in those games and are now the proud owners of the third worst goal differential in the NHL. Thanks to the skid, they’ve slid to second last in the Western Conference, ahead of only the woeful Arizona Coyotes.
Weirdly, no one seems to really care that the Canucks have crashed to the bottom of the NHL standings.
Part of that is Team Tank, who welcome the lowest possible finish in the standings. Part of if is the understanding that the Canucks have had some truly dreadful luck with injuries. Part of it is that they keep playing entertaining hockey and Brock Boeser keeps scoring goals. That’s enough to make any amount of losing at least palatable.
Can you imagine the mood in Vancouver if the Canucks were losing at the same rate and Boeser wasn’t scoring goals? People would be in sackcloth and ashes despite having no clue where to find sackcloth and ashes these days. They, like life, would find a way.
I watched this game.
- The Christmas carol “Good King Wenceslas” (which isn't really a Christmas carol as much as it’s a Boxing Day carol seeing as it takes place on the Feast of St. Stephen but that’s beside the point) tells the tale of a king who sets out across the ice to bring joy to a poor, beleaguered people. His page follows literally in his footsteps, allowing him to avoid being lost in the winter storm. The carol is about, of course, Brock Boeser, and it’s a prayer for the rest of the Canucks to follow in his steps to avoid the dark despair of this dreary winter.
- Was anyone else excited to see Ben Hutton return to the lineup? Just me? That’s fair. He was pretty good! He played 16:33, which was more than Erik Gudbranson and Troy Stecher, and skated a regular shift on the penalty kill, which didn’t give up a goal for the first time in seven games.
- Like Straight No Chaser’s version of “The 12 Days of Christmas,” the Canucks’ defence was a chaotic mess that somehow worked out. The team dressed seven defencemen, but instead of skating one of them as a forward, simply rotated through the second and third pairings depending on the situation. It was weird and seemed likely to devolve into chaos, but it somehow all held together.
- Choosing Alexes Edler and Biega as the only defence pairing to keep together for the whole game was an odd choice. As much as Biega has been very good of late, giving him big minutes with Edler on a shutdown pairing seems like a really bad idea. Specifically, it’s a Willie Desjardins idea, as the former Canucks coach tried the two together last season when Chris Tanev was worked. The pairing didn't work then and it was only marginally better in this game.
- The Canucks’ defence gave up some dangerous scoring chances, but the Blues didn’t score on any of them. Instead, they scored a couple softies on Jacob Markstrom, with the second goal one of the softest he’s given up all year. Markstrom has now given up 23 goals in six games since his posted his first career shutout.
- The first goal was a little more forgivable, as it came on a backhand and those, like a William Faulkner novel, are difficult to read. Troy Stecher got caught on the wrong side of Patrik Berglund, giving him a free path to the slot, from which he floated his backhand by Markstrom. Stecher seemed to anticipate switching checks with Nic Dowd, but Dowd stuck with his own man. That was like a classmate refusing to share notes with a sick student: it left Stecher even further behind.
- The second Blues’ goal was uglier than a Bull Terrier wearing Dog Uggs. Kyle Brodziak’s shot came from about a foot above the goal-line near the boards and there was no one for him to pass to, so Markstrom only had to play the shot. Somehow, it snuck in between his body and the post.
- Ben Hutton was on the ice for all three 5-on-5 goals, so ended up minus-1, despite doing nothing wrong on either goal by the Blues. I’m just pointing this out as yet another reminder that plus/minus is a terrible, misleading statistic.
- Markstrom may have let in two soft goals, but they were the only two goals he allowed, which means he made a lot of really good saves. It looks bad when the game-winning goal is an ugly one from a bad angle, but Markstrom didn’t cost the Canucks the game, and the 12 saves he made in the third period gave them a chance to tie things up and potentially win. The Canucks just couldn’t find another goal.
- At least Brock Boeser scored! The hotshot rookie gave Canucks fans a Christmas present: 20 goals! That’s as many as Bo Horvat scored all of last season, when he led the Canucks in goalscoring. That statistic should get you excited about Boeser, but also give you flashbacks of last season’s awfulness. My goodness, that was a terrible season.
- Thomas Vanek made a superb play to set up Boeser with an open net. He picked Paul Stastny’s pocket, then listened when Boeser shouted, “Hey! Hey!” and dropped the puck back to him at the backdoor for the finish. I’m doing my best to avoid thinking, “Way to increase your trade value!” every time he tallies a point, but he’s making it really hard to avoid.
- Boeser had two golden opportunities to score again, getting time and space to shoot off the rush down the left wing, but for seemingly the first time, he hit a goaltender in the logo. It’s something that happens all the time for other players, but it was shocking to see it from Boeser. It was like seeing People magazine name Blake Shelton the Sexiest Man Alive: it just made you want to ask, “Are you okay? Is there...is there something wrong?”
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Travis Green likes having a defence-first shutdown line that he can use to match-up against the best forward line on the other team. Without Brandon Sutter and Derek Dorsett, Green has tried a couple different combinations, but settled on Brendan Gaunce, Nic Dowd, and Jake Virtanen against the Blues. They had a legitimately great game matched up against Patrik Berglund, Brayden Schenn, and Vladimir Tarasenko, with Virtanen in particular flying and creating chances. When Dowd was up against Schenn and Tarasenko, the Blues didn’t even get a shot on goal, though Berglund did score when Dowd was on the ice.
