Miserable month ends with fowl stench
Ducks pounce on lacklustre visitors, who lay another egg and lose Virtanen
ANAHEIM, Calif. — Last year, the Vancouver Canucks had a November to remember.
This year, they had one they’d just as soon forget.
The Canucks are happy to flip the calendar after ending the month by dropping an ugly 4-0 National Hockey League decision Monday to the Anaheim Ducks at the Honda Center.
The loss completed a miserable 4-7-3 record in November. Last season, they went 9-4-1 in November.
The Canucks’ record is now 9-9-7 through 25 games. They are on pace for 80 points, which in the NHL will get you a long summer. Last season, the Canucks were 17-7-1 through 25 games. This is the first time the Canucks will enter December with fewer than 10 wins since the 1998-99 season.
The Canucks have been in most games this season. They were never really in this one at all as they suffered their most lopsided loss of the season and were blanked for the first time.
Even captain Henrik Sedin, who can normally find a silver lining of sorts after a loss, couldn’t come up with anything good to say about this one.
“This was the furthest we have been from being in a game than we have all year,” Sedin said. “We knew it was a big game coming in. Our energy level wasn’t there.”
Sedin said the Canucks’ defensive play is continuing to cost them.
“We have been good all year creating offence,” he said. “That’s not the problem. We have to realize that to win in this league you can’t give up three or four goals every game. It’s impossible. I have said it before, it’s a league where the best teams score an average of three goals a game. If you give up more than that, you can’t win.
“Our offensive numbers are good if you look around the league, but the way we give up goals, the penalties we take, they are small things, but they add up. In a game like this, that is going to cost you.”
The Canucks lost more than the game. Rookie winger Jake Virtanen left the game midway through the first period and did not return. Coach Willie Desjardins said he suffered an upperbody injury that is not serious. But Desjardins said Virtanen will not play tonight when Vancouver meets the Kings in Los Angeles.
Virtanen was hurt when he was cross-checked from behind by Anaheim centre Ryan Getzlaf and fell to the ice. Getzlaf received a tripping penalty on the play. The first period started badly and didn’t end well for the Canucks.
The rest of the period wasn’t great either.
Shawn Horcoff converted an Andrew Cogliano pass at 1:19 of the first after the Canucks got hemmed in their own end.
Rickard Rakell scored a powerplay goal with three seconds left in the period, to give the Ducks a 2-0 lead. When Rakell chipped the puck past Ryan Miller, all four Canuck penalty-killers were behind the Vancouver goalie.
“We didn’t have a good first period, but we were there until the last 10 seconds of that period,” said Desjardins. “That was a big (second) goal. We found a little bit of legs in the second and then they scored to start the third.”
If there was any doubt about the outcome — and really there wasn’t — it ended one minute into the third period when Jakob Silfverberg wired a shot from above the right faceoff circle short side past Miller to make it 3-0.
Corey Perry made it 4-0 on a breakaway at 8:39 of the third after a Dan Hamhuis giveaway. That ended the night for Miller, who gave up four goals on 29 shots. He was replaced by Jacob Markstrom.
“I thought we got jumped in the first a little bit,” Miller said.
“We levelled it out in the second, but they were playing pretty good structure. We had to find ways to get behind them and draw some penalties and they stuck to it pretty well.”
The win moved the Ducks to within two points of the Canucks.
Both teams remain under the Western Conference playoff bar.
The loss was Vancouver’s first in regulation time against a Pacific Division opponent this season. The Canucks are now 4-1-2 versus Pacific foes this season.
Desjardins said he expects Markstrom will start tonight’s game against the Kings.