Sometimes when a team embarks on the long voyage that is an 82-game NHL season, they leave port in a leaky boat. When that’s the case, you have to hope that you have a really good goaltender to bail you out.
Obviously, it would be better if the boat didn’t have any leaks in the first place. But some shipwrights, knowing they have a top-tier bucket on hand, cut corners.
Unfortunately, occasionally your top-tier bucket suffers a bizarre and rare injury to its popliteus muscle and isn’t available to bail out your leaky boat for a couple of months. Then you have to turn to your backup buckets and sometimes they’re as leaky as the boat.
The Vancouver Canucks were a little bit leaky against the Boston Bruins on Tuesday but Kevin Lankinen repeatedly bailed them out for a 2-0 shutout. On Wednesday, the leaks continued against the Pittsburgh Penguins but Arturs Silovs couldn’t match Lankinen’s performance, giving up four goals on ten shots in the first period, and then a fifth goal early in the second period.
It’s not like all five goals were solely Silovs’ fault — they were preceded by some pretty ugly play by the skaters in front of him — but that’s when you depend on your goaltender to come up with a save or two to bail you out and keep the game from getting out of hand.
On Wednesday night, just one more save would have made the difference, as the Canucks pushed back hard in the third period to get the score within one, but couldn’t find the tying goal in the dying seconds of the game.
At this point, how can the Canucks put their trust in Silovs? The 23-year-old goaltender has just one win in six starts, with a 4.11 goals against average and an .847 save percentage. Those are not NHL-caliber numbers.
“He’s struggling,” admitted head coach Rick Tocchet. “He’s got to battle. He’s got to get bigger in the net and battle. It is what it is. He’s got to work tomorrow and get at his game.”
Just six months ago, Silovs was seen as the heir apparent to Thatcher Demko after stepping into a tough spot in the Stanley Cup Playoffs and helping the Canucks reach Game 7 in the second round. Now, whenever Demko finally returns to the lineup, Silovs will surely be sent down to the AHL, where he’ll have a lot of work to do to rebuild his game.
To be clear, Silovs is young as goaltenders go and still has time to work towards the NHL. Consider Jacob Markstrom, who didn’t fully break through as an NHL backup until he was 25 and didn’t become a number one goaltender until he was 27.
This season, however, Silovs isn’t ready, at least not for a team that seemingly needs to be bailed out as often as the Canucks.
The Canucks had me missing a bucket when I watched this game.
- I warned in the preview of this game that it could be a trap and, sure enough. The Canucks came out in the first period like they expected an easy opponent and were swiftly put in their place by a proud and desperate Penguins team that doesn’t want to be buried in the basement of the league, even if their management is clearly embarking on a rebuild. The Canucks got trapped in the first and couldn’t escape by the end of regulation.
- “Can’t start like that,” said Quinn Hughes, who blamed himself for the opening goal. “It starts with me and I know better.”
- “I like the battle back from us but we can’t come out with an effort like that to start and expect to win a game,” said Elias Pettersson. “Gotta be better and especially start on time. We didn’t give Arty any help back there.”
- “The first period…we gifted them goals,” said Tocchet. “Seemingly every shot went in but we also gifted some goals. Then you’re behind 4-1.”
- The opening goal started with a giveaway in the defensive zone by Filip Hronek. A few seconds later, Silovs overplayed a point shot that went well wide, so when the puck banked off the end boards to the other side of the net, he was left scrambling to get across. Blake Lizotte, left unmarked by Hughes, was first to the puck and found a hole in Silovs to open the scoring.
- Five minutes later, Aatu Räty responded for the Canucks. Max Sasson got a piece of a clearing attempt and Räty jumped on the loose puck. His initial shot got blocked by Marcus Pettersson but Räty got a lot of juice on his second attempt, snapping the puck past Tristan Jarry. Sasson picked up an assist for his second point in as many games and also cut in front of Jarry right at the release point of the shot to take away his eyes — metaphorically, because literally, that would be gross.
- Elias Pettersson has been stepping up his physical game of later and he dropped Philip Tomasino with a solid open-ice hit midway through the first period. It was a classic Niklas Kronwall-style back/butt hit, except Kronwall always had a little more heft behind his hits.
- Carson Soucy and Noah Juulsen share the blame on the second Penguins goal. Soucy chased the puck carrier up to the point instead of passing him off to Conor Garland, so was miles away from the front of the net. Then Noah Juulsen left Rickard Rakell wide open in front (very dangerous) when he spotted that Sidney Crosby was open in the corner (not very dangerous). Bryan Rust got the pass through to Rakell and he chipped the puck over Silovs, who made himself just a little guy as he came across the net.
- Then the Penguins' power play made it 3-1, as Silovs gave up a weak rebound on an Evgeni Malkin shot and Juulsen failed to tie up Kevin Hayes’ stick, allowing him to chip it inside the far post.
- “It’s the goalmouth stuff that seems to be going in all year and I think [Silovs] has just got to get a little bit bigger in there,” said Tocchet. “I don’t know, I’ll have to talk to Marko [Torenius], the goalie coach, but it just seems like when you don’t have confidence, you sink in your net. He’s got to battle — it’s like everybody, when you’re struggling, you’ve got to battle through it.”
- Then, with two minutes left in the first period, Tyler Myers and Quinn Hughes got spread too far, like butter scraped over too much bread, leaving room for Crosby to cut between them through the middle of the ice. Hughes came across to pressure Crosby but was able to slip a pass under his stick to Rust, who had a step or six on Brock Boeser. Silovs read the play poorly, going down too early, which left him no chance to explode across the net to stop Rust, who had a tap-in to make it 4-1.
- Myers got burned on the 5-1 goal in the second period, as he got caught moving the wrong way as Rust cut inside through the neutral zone. That left Rust with all kinds of room to pick his spot on Silovs, going casually over the shoulder, the way cool kids in high school wear their backpacks to give themselves future chronic back pain.
- The Canucks finally started to push back once they were down four goals, which is typically not a winning strategy in hockey. Pius Suter became the Canucks’ leading goalscorer with his seventh goal of the season. He came off the bench, took a pass from Hughes and eagerly stepped into a slap shot like it was a comfy pair of sweatpants to send the puck past Jarry on the short side.
- The officials were in full “let them play” mode through most of the game, ignoring plenty of penalties and what looked like several clear icings. But even in the playoffs, infractions that take away obvious scoring chances get called, which is why it was baffling to see Jake DeBrusk blatantly hooked and hauled down by Lizotte while driving to the net for a Kiefer Sherwood pass and not hear a whistle, especially considering what did get called in the third period.
- The Canucks comeback attempt in the third period kicked off with a brilliant solo effort by Hughes to make it 5-3. Pettersson broke up a Penguins rush in the defensive zone and Hughes grabbed the loose puck and took off through the neutral zone. He slashed diagonally into the offensive zone, deked past Rust, and lifted the puck just over Jarry’s left pad. It was a bit of brilliance in an otherwise dismal loss.
- It was almost a jump shot from Hughes, as he had to quickly transfer weight onto his stick mid-stride, causing an odd leap as he shot the puck. When the puck went in the net, Hughes was actually still airborne.
- “I just made a defensive play and he went end-to-end,” said Pettersson. “That was all Quinn’s effort.”
- To Silovs’ credit, after he gave up 5 goals on 13 shots, he shut the door the rest of the way, like a modern-day Grant Fuhr without the goal support. His biggest save came on a shorthanded breakaway by Lizotte on the Canucks’ lone power play of the game, getting just enough of the puck to steer it wide.
- When you give the opposing team a 5-1 lead, you can’t blame the officiating if you lose, but it was still frustrating that the Canucks’ comeback attempt was disrupted by a couple of dreadful penalty calls. Garland was left in disbelief when he got called for hooking Erik Karlsson and his incredulity was warranted; it was a perfectly executed stick check by Garland that didn’t touch Karlsson’s hands.
- Then Sidney Crosby suckered the referees into calling another penalty with some classic embellishment. Aatu Räty did skate into the path of Crosby as he moved in on the forecheck but Crosby made a meal of it, skating into Räty, then snapping his head back dramatically before doubling over as if in agony. Come on, now.
- The Canucks killed off the penalties and kept pushing. With Silovs pulled for the extra attacker, Hughes fired a shot into traffic, hitting Garland in the back of the leg. Pettersson scooped up the loose puck, pulled it to his forehand, and deposited it in the net to make it 5-4 with just under two minutes remaining. It was a painful assist for Garland, who limped back to the bench while cussing loudly.
- Unfortunately, the Canucks couldn’t complete the comeback. Even more unfortunately, Filip Hronek went awkwardly into the boards in the final minute and appeared to injure his right shoulder. He went straight to the bench and down the tunnel, even dropping his stick along the way as he no longer seemed able to hold it.
- Here’s hoping it’s a stinger rather than something more serious. Given the state of the Canucks’ defence, they can ill afford to lose Hronek.
