The Province

Quality still the king in today’s NHL

Despite an infusion of youth, Canucks hard-pressed to keep pace with L.A.’s veterans

- PATRICK JOHNSTON pjohnston@postmedia.com @risingacti­on

More often than not, the team with the players who are a little better and a little quicker tends to win the game.

Even taking into account the absence of Vancouver Canucks wunderkind Elias Pettersson, Monday night’s 4-1 pre-season loss to the Los Angeles Kings in Salt Lake City was a sobering reminder of the challenges the local hockey squadron will face this coming season.

The Canucks weren’t bad, but they just weren’t all that good. Playing against a very strong Kings team, the Canucks struggled to generate much offence and when push came to shove, they just couldn’t keep the Kings off the score sheet.

It’s hard to win when you score just once. The shots-on-goal battle finished pretty even — 29-26 for the Canucks — but on average, L.A.’s were better.

And it’s that slow aggregate death that will be the Canucks’ challenge this season. At some point, the difference in speed and skill starts to add up.

That’s where Pettersson will surely help. We’ve already seen a good dose of the difference he makes in the lineup, so there’s hope there, but not all of the Canucks’ problems are going to be solved by a 19-year-old rookie.

And here’s another item to look to if you’re searching for upside: Brock Boeser isn’t going to go goalless forever.

Here’s what we learned:

RUSHIN’ DEFENCEMEN

“It’s not easy to score in this league,” has been a regular response from Canucks defencemen this pre-season, when asked how the team is going to generate more offence.

The Canucks got pitiful production from their back end in 2017-18, finishing second last in the NHL in primary points accumulate­d by defencemen.

Much of the talk from coach Travis Green has been about the need for his defencemen to play more aggressive, to get in on the rush more than they have.

They have yet to produce results from the approach, but there’s no doubt Troy Stecher got the message on Monday night. He was leading the rush and even the forecheck multiple times over the course of the evening.

He even pulled off a nifty spin-o-rama at the end of the second period to get around a Kings defender and create a scoring chance.

Add in him being solid in his own end and it’s fair to say that Stecher was the Canucks’ best player on the night.

EVEN-STRENGTH GOALS

The Canucks now have four even-strength goals through five pre-season games. Yes, it’s just pre-season, but when even the coach acknowledg­es it’s a worry, it’s a talking point.

Sam Gagner picked up his team’s fourth goal at five-onfive on a nice slapshot. He had jumped out of the penalty box after serving a bench minor for too many men on the ice and found himself sprung on a two-on-one rush with Tim Schaller by a Stecher pass.

He carried the puck down below the faceoff dot and picked the top right corner over Jonathan Quick’s shoulder.

POWER-PLAY PERSISTENC­E

It’s becoming increasing­ly clear that the new-look Canucks power play will be a strength. Even missing Pettersson, the Canucks’ man

advantage created lots of shots and had plenty of good puck movement.

Gagner was put in the Pettersson spot on the right halfboards and although he’s a right shot, he meshed well with the rest of the Canucks’ first unit.

The Canucks’ second unit had moments, too, showing good distributi­on and probably might have scored against a goalie other than Quick as the Kings goalie made a couple of impressive flexible saves on back-door chances.

THOSE NETS

Playing hockey in arenas that aren’t used to hosting hockey is often interestin­g. There’s always questions about the ice: “just OK,” Travis Green rated it after the morning skate.

But it seems like we should have asked about the nets.

Inside the game’s first nine minutes, there were already five — yes, five — cases of the nets popping out of the ice. There was one more, just to even things out at three at each end of the ice, near the end of the period.

Standard NHL pegs go into holes that are drilled right into a concrete base. As Canucks radio analyst Alex Auld noted, since this rink was laid atop a basketball court, this wasn’t possible.

Jacob Markstrom was whistled for a penalty at 7:54 of the first for freezing the puck inside the faceoff circle. But the way he was pleading his case, it seemed like he was trying to point out to the officials that the net was dislodged and he was merely looking to help them out.

 ?? — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS ?? Vancouver Canucks defenceman Alex Biega and forward Nikolay Goldobin collide as Los Angeles Kings defenceman Jake Muzzin, left, looks on Monday during the Kings’ 4-1 pre-season victory in Salt Lake City.
— THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Vancouver Canucks defenceman Alex Biega and forward Nikolay Goldobin collide as Los Angeles Kings defenceman Jake Muzzin, left, looks on Monday during the Kings’ 4-1 pre-season victory in Salt Lake City.
 ??  ??
 ??  ??

Newspapers in English

Newspapers from Canada