The Vancouver Canucks have talked a lot this season about needing “a full 60.”
On Tuesday night, that meant a full 60 seconds, as the Canucks made an incredibly improbable comeback against the Dallas Stars in the final minute of the third period.
Down 5-2 and with a loss in regulation meaning they were officially eliminated from the playoffs, the Canucks came up with a miracle, scoring three goals in 53 seconds to tie the game before completing the comeback with Kiefer Sherwood’s overtime game-winner.
The Canucks were subsequently ousted from playoff contention the very next day when the San Jose Sharks’ own three-goal comeback came up short in overtime against the Minnesota Wild. But still, the Canucks’ comeback will live on beyond this season, if only as trivia: it’s the latest three-goal comeback in NHL history.
A lot can be said about the goals the Canucks scored in that final minute. Marcus Pettersson made a series of phenomenal plays on Aatu Räty’s goal at 19:00 that got the comeback started, while Conor Garland provided an outstanding setup for Pius Suter’s goal 31 seconds later that made the comeback actually seem like a realistic possibility.
But let’s focus on the third goal of the trifecta; the one that made the previous two goals actually matter.
There are a lot of interesting details in the goal and it deserves a full breakdown, which it will get in a feature we at Pass it to Bulis like to call “Breakdowning.”
First, we'll watch the goal; then, we'll break it down.
What a gloriously chaotic goal. Let's get to the breakdown.
Canucks and Stars roll call
Let’s start with our cast of characters.
The Canucks called timeout after Suter's first goal, giving them a chance to not only plan out their attack off the faceoff at centre ice but also rest their top players, so the choice of skaters on the ice is very deliberate.
The Canucks’ top defence pairing of Quinn Hughes and Filip Hronek is on the ice, of course. Hughes spent time with Victor Mancini and Elias “Junior” Pettersson in this game but, when it came to the crunch, he was back with Hronek.
At forward, the Canucks have their top two wingers, Jake DeBrusk and Brock Boeser, but they don’t have their stand-in first-line centre between them. Instead, it’s Aatu Räty.
It should be noted that Suter lost the faceoff after Räty’s goal and the Canucks were fortunate to get quickly regain possession leading to Suter’s first goal that made it 5-4. On the ensuing faceoff, with just 29 seconds left, Canucks head coach Rick Tocchet turned to his rookie faceoff ace, Aatu Räty, to take the draw.
Only, Räty wasn’t acing the faceoffs that night. Heading into that faceoff, Räty was 3-for-11 in the game, a far cry from his team-high 57.3% on the season.
Still, Tocchet trusted the assignment to Räty, a tremendous vote of confidence in the young centre.
On the Stars’ side of things, they have their top two defencemen, Thomas Harley and Esa Lindell on the ice, both of whom are left-handed shots. Evidently, they didn’t trust the right-handed Ilya Lyubushkin, Cody Ceci, or Mathew Dumba to close out the game.
At forward, the Stars don’t have a defensive specialist line on the ice. It’s just their top line of Jason Robertson, Roope Hintz, and Mikko Rantanen. I’m not judging whether that was a good or bad choice; I’m just pointing it out.
It should be noted that the Stars’ third and fourth lines were on the ice for the two previous goals and second-line centre Matt Duchene was on the ice for Kiefer Sherwood’s overtime winner, so the Stars’ collapse was really a full-team effort.
Not pictured are goaltenders Thatcher Demko and Casey DeSmith. Also not pictured: a whole bunch of Stars fans who left early to beat the traffic when their team was up by three goals in the final minutes of regulation.
Demko, of course, was going to be heading to the bench right away. In fact, the bench door is already open in anticipation of his arrival, even if the awful digital board ads are partially obscuring that fact. Both Demko and Räty will be heading to the bench to be replaced by Suter and Garland.
Get the heck off the ice
Räty had one job to do. He did it.
After a clean faceoff win, Räty bolts to the bench, skating faster than we’ve seen him skate all season. Despite kicking off the comeback with some great poise and presence of mind earlier in the minute, Räty is not staying on the ice.
Räty ran off like a spurned lover who just realized they were being used.
Demko also gets his hustle on, skating hard to the bench. They actually closed the bench door and need to open it again. Not very efficient.
In the meantime, the right guy has the puck: Quinn Hughes. As he holds onto the puck waiting for Suter and Garland to join them, the three other skaters loop back, getting right to rush up the ice.
What’s intriguing here is that all three — DeBrusk, Boeser, and Hronek — are going to end up heading to the same place. It’s a clear set play.
The overload and the open man
Hronek and Boeser both skate hard up the right side, while DeBrusk loops up the left side, then cuts across the blue line to the right, trying to draw across the Stars’ defence in the process.
It sort of works. Suter comes on for Räty and heads straight for the Stars’ blue line on the left side, where he has a little bit of room thanks to the overload on the right side, but not that much. Lindell isn’t fooled and gaps up on Suter quickly, but that’s okay.
The plan isn’t for Suter to skate in on the left side. His job is to send the puck into the right corner so that the overload can win the battle on the boards.
The overload is completely effective because not only did Lindell move to check Suter, so did Hintz. With Rantanen in the neutral zone keeping an eye on Hughes and Garland, the Canucks have a 3-on-2 brewing in the right corner.
Outnumber, outplay, outlast
DeBrusk actually veers off to the front of the net, just in case one of Boeser or Hronek wins the puck immediately and throws it to the crease. That doesn’t happen, so he joins the battle in the corner.
Perhaps it would have been better if DeBrusk had gone straight to the corner. Instead of the 3-on-2 that was promised, we instead have a 3-on-3, as Hintz has joined the battle.
Not to worry; the Canucks are about to outnumber the Stars again, as Suter swoops across the ice to join the battle, while Garland sneaks in from the point hoping for a loose puck.
Also, there’s a guy who was told that the Stars’ main colour is green and replied, “You mean highlighter yellow? Say no more!”
Just two seconds later, the Stars have entirely conceded the battle for numbers, as it swiftly turns from a 3-on-3 in the corner to a 4-on-1.
To a certain extent, it’s a prudent decision by the Stars. Hintz and Robertson back off from the battle, because the last thing they want is to get caught in the corner if the puck gets loose, as that would leave just two Stars guarding the middle of the ice. That leaves just Harley in the corner, trying to hold the puck on the wall.
On the other hand, that makes it far more likely that the Canucks will jar the puck loose and gain possession, with Garland lurking along the boards ready to pick up that puck.
But that shouldn’t be a big deal, as long as the Stars guard the middle of the ice. There’s no chance that they’re going to leave anyone alone in the slot. Right?
Here’s the reverse-angle view of the key play. Harley does a pretty good job of fending off DeBrusk and Hronek, but Suter jars the puck free, it gets picked up by Boeser, and he protects the puck from Robertson and gets it to Garland.
Now the Canucks are in business. The overload worked, they won the battle, and now they have the puck under control with about ten seconds left.
The perennially-open Pius Suter
What is remarkable about the next few seconds is that Suter is unmarked the entire time. Robertson comes the closest to checking Suter but, for the most part, he’s left all alone in the slot.
Let us remember that Suter just scored from the slot about 20 seconds ago, which should be fresh in the minds of the Stars. He’s also in prime position for one of the Canucks’ favourite plays: a point shot looking for a deflection.
The thing about Suter is that he’s very unassuming. He’s possibly the most nondescript player in the NHL. Like his country, Suter is neutral. When he wants to, he can kind of just fade into the background.
So, even though Suter just scored and is in the slot — the most dangerous area of the ice — he gets ignored.
It’s also kind of hilarious how much room Rantanen gives Hughes at the point. As soon as Garland got the puck, it was blatantly obvious to everyone on the planet earth that he was going to move it to Hughes, and yet Rantanen is miles away from him.
My guess is that the last thing Rantanen wants to do is to close too quickly on Hughes, as the Canucks captain has a tendency to make his opponents look very foolish. Rantanen doesn’t want to give Hughes the opportunity to get past him to create a scoring chances for himself, so he plays the situation as cautiously as possible.
Either that or Rantanen legitimately had no idea the puck was going to go to Hughes.
The puck pinballs wide
Hughes gets the puck and, with Rantanen giving him plenty of space, he finds a shooting lane and fires the puck toward the net.
Let’s just take a moment to look at the path of the puck here. Suter does a quick shoulder check as he heads to the shooting lane, checking to see the position of everyone on the ice. Perhaps he can see that DeSmith has tracked the puck well and is in position to make a save on a direct shot, so he tries to tip the puck down.
Only, he gets too much of the puck, deflecting it well wide. Instead of the puck skittering into the corner, however, it hits Hronek right in the shaft of his stick in between his hands.
That very nearly sends the puck into the net but it instead bounces just wide.
The Stars on the ice all immediately turn and look to see where the puck has gone and no one is picking up Suter, who smartly hangs back instead of crashing toward the net.
Actually, no one picks up Boeser either. If Hronek had seen Boeser and passed it to him, he would have been wide-open for a scoring chance.
This is on Robertson, ultimately. Harley has stepped away from DeBrusk to try to check Hronek as he goes for the loose puck. Lindell, who had stepped away from the net to front the Hughes shot and try to get a block, can easily get back to the net to tie up DeBrusk in front. There’s no reason for Robertson to go the front of the net; he needs to pick his head up and spot the danger.
Even if he had kept his head on a swivel, though, what are the odds that he decides to check Suter instead of Boeser? Which guy would you check: the guy who scored 40 goals last season and already has a miraculous buzzer-beater goal this season? Or Pius Suter?
You can give Rantanen a piece of the blame too. With the seconds ticking off the clock, he needed to recognize the danger presented by Suter and try to get to him. Instead, he’s off standing by the sideboards.
The puck is past DeSmith before he can even react
Hronek probably wasn’t trying to pass the puck to Suter. It’s far more likely that he’s trying to get it to DeBrusk on top of the crease. That’s where DeSmith’s eyes go as he tries to track the puck.
You can see that DeSmith is still looking down after Suter has already released the puck. The Stars’ goaltender has absolutely no idea where the puck is.
Part of the reason is that Harley was able to disrupt Hronek’s pass, getting just a piece of it so that it slides right between DeBrusk’s legs.
You can see just how obvious it is that DeSmith has completely lost track of the puck in the slow-motion replay.
It’s a good thing too. If DeSmith had moved even an inch to his right, he probably makes the save, because Suter’s shot hits DeSmith in the right shoulder, with the goaltender not even reacting to the shot until it hits him.
Garland’s incredible leap
Suter’s celebration is as subdued as he is. It’s an incredible moment, one for the literal history books, and Suter gives little more than a subtle fist pump while checking to make sure that the goal actually came before time ran out on the clock.
Conor Garland, on the other hand…
No one celebrates a goal like Garland. He leaps into the air like this is the greatest goal that has even been scored in the history of hockey.
It’s my favourite part of the goal.
Meanwhile, the Stars fans still in attendance are doubly mad. Not only did they not get to beat the traffic, they had to watch their team collapse in historical fashion.
These two Stars fans react by throwing invisible rocks at their team.
Others just hold their head in their hands in disbelief and man, I get it. That’s pretty much what I did when I saw that goal.
What about you, Stars head coach Pete DeBoer? What are you feelings on the matter.
Yeah. That’s about right.
