The first game of the season can lead to all sorts of overreactions. There’s a tendency to make grand, sweeping judgements about the entire season to come based on how a team performs on opening night.
Sometimes, that temptation to overreact strikes after just 20 minutes.
The Vancouver Canucks utterly dominated the first period of Wednesday night’s home opener, out-shooting the Calgary Flames 15-to-5 and out-scoring them 4-to-1. More than that, the Canucks were flying in transition, creating more rush chances in one period than seemingly all of last season. It was exactly the kind of fast-paced, quick-strike offence that head coach Rick Tocchet said he wanted from the Canucks this season.
Could you blame Canucks fans for overreacting to such a strong start? It was easy to believe that this was what Canucks fans could look forward to all season: dominant, exciting, winning hockey.
And then the rest of the game happened.
The Flames took over the game after the first period. It was gradual, at first, with the Flames out-shooting the Canucks 10-to-3 in the second period but only scoring one goal, so it was easy to believe that it wasn’t a big deal. The Canucks were still in control of the game, right? The team that let so few leads slip away last season wasn’t going to let a three-goal lead slip away in game one of this season.
Right?
But then the Flames scored three more goals in the third period to take a 5-4 lead. Only a miraculous last-minute goal by J.T. Miller to tie the game — shades of last year’s cardiac Canucks in the playoffs — earned them a point before they lost in overtime.
It was a messy, sloppy hockey game, the kind that a coach like Rick Tocchet despises. But he knew he didn’t have to say anything to his players about it.
“There’s really not much for me to rip on those guys,” said Tocchet. “They know what happened tonight and we’ve got to move on…A couple of players even said it: a little too much summer hockey.”
Conor Garland said that the team “didn’t play our style of hockey” while J.T. Miller bluntly said it had nothing to do with systems but that there wasn’t enough will and compete.
Really, that dominant first period might have been the worst thing that could have happened. It made them complacent.
“We just got too comfortable,” said Brock Boeser. “I think we thought it was going to be easy. They just out-competed us those last two periods — everyone could see it. We know it’s unacceptable, so we have to learn from it.”
The lesson is simple: there are no easy games in the NHL.
“Anybody can beat you at any time if you’re not ready,” said Tocchet. “You’ve got to respect the game.”
“They worked really hard, so you’ve got to tip your cap,” said Miller. “We made it easy on them. We gave them every chance to get back into the game.”
But just like it was too early to overreact to one dominant period by the Canucks, it’s too early to overreact to them giving up a three-goal lead. It’s just the first game of the regular season, with another 81 games remaining. The Canucks were very good at shaking off both wins and losses last season and coming into the next day ready to work. They’ll need to do it again this season.
“It’s one game,” said Tocchet. “If it’s a trend for four-or-five games, I’d be worried, but it’s one. We’ll sharpen up tomorrow.”
So, I won’t overreact to this game but I will overanalyze this game, because that’s what I must do after I watched this game.
- The loss isn’t all on Arturs Silovs but that’s how goaltending statistics work and when you give up six goals on 25 shots, at least a tiny tidbit of blame is going to be tossed in your direction. A morsel of fault. A modicum of responsibility. A smidgeon of incrimination.
- The game started off on a hilarious note, as Tyler Myers lost a skate blade in front of the Canucks net. When most players lose a skate blade, they’re like Bambi on ice. When the guy losing a skate blade is already a giraffe, it’s an even more exaggerated version of that. Unfortunately, the TV cameras panned away, so most of the hilarity was lost for those not at the game in person.
- To top it off, the referee trying to help Myers to the bench — something they’re not supposed to do — slipped and fell too, because Myers is just too big and heavy to push. It was a Keystone Kops routine minus the sped-up film.
- Things took a turn for the serious when a collision between J.T. Miller and Kevin Rooney sent the Flames centre careening hard into the boards. Rooney’s head whiplashed sideways against the boards and he seemed to immediately lose consciousness. It wasn’t really a dirty hit but there’s an element of similarity to how the Flames’ Adam Klapka gave Akito Hirose a concussion in the preseason, as both were flung dangerously into the boards.
- “It was a clean hit, I think, but I haven’t seen it again,” said Miller. “I know he’s a good dude and a good player. You never want to see anybody laying like that on the ice. Obviously, I understand sometimes you have to answer for stuff like that on the ice.
- Miller did answer for the hit, as he was chased down multiple times by Flames players before he dropped the gloves with Anthony Mantha, giving as good as he got in the process. Thus, the code was satisfied and Miller, who hadn’t really done anything wrong in the first place, was no longer in danger of being the victim of a retaliatory headshot.
- The Canucks ended up with a power play out of the post-hit scrum and Daniel Sprong opened the scoring with the man advantage. It’s the fourth time in his career that Sprong has scored in his first game with a new team, which is pretty cool, though it is a feat you can only accomplish if you play for a bunch of different teams.
- Conor Garland deserves a lot of credit for the opening goal, though he didn’t get an assist. He gained the zone with a nifty pass to himself off the boards, then slipped the puck to Danton Heinen, who relayed it to Filip Hronek at the point. Hronek set up Daniel Sprong, who launched the puck into the top corner with an insanely quick release, like he was letting go of a coiled-up spring and oh! Now I get his name.
- After the second unit got on the board, the Canucks’ first unit wanted to get in on the action. DeBrusk moved down low to take a pass from Elias Pettersson, then slipped a pass through to Boeser in the slot. Boeser had plenty of space to finish off the play but knocked it up a notch with a blast from his spice weasel, sending the puck off the post and in with a satisfying and spicy “ping.”
- At one point, Garland got hit hard by MacKenzie Weegar — the type of hit that might have resulted in a fight — but Garland quickly held out his hand as Filip Hronek looked like he was about to step in to defend his teammate and instead pointed at the other end of the ice, where the Canucks were creating a chance. A moment later, Garland was in the slot finishing off a Nils Höglander rebound to make it 3-0. See, sometimes the way of peace leads to good things.
- The Flames wanted Garland’s goal disallowed as Dan Vladar lost his mask in the melee but the rules state that the play must continue if the opposing team has an “immediate and impending scoring opportunity.” Garland’s rebound certainly counts as one of those.
- Generally speaking, J.T. Miller had a great game, getting a Gordie Howe Hat Trick with a goal and an assist to go with his fight. But at times he sure looked like a guy who only played one preseason game, like when he sent an ill-advised pass to the point right after Mantha stepped out of the penalty box, giving Mantha a shorthanded breakaway. Mantha tucked the puck five-hole on a pretty little deke to get the Flames on the board.
- The Canucks restored the three-goal lead technically not on the power play, as it came one second after a Martin Pospisil penalty ended but before Pospisil had even stepped back on the ice. Miller fired a hard pass to Boeser on the doorstep and, like a chef adding just the right garnish to a dish, Boeser gave Miller’s dish the finishing touch.
- After the chaos of the first period, the second period calmed things down considerably, to the detriment of the Canucks. The Flames out-shot the Canucks 10-to-3 in the second frame, as all of the Canucks’ transition game seemed to vanish.
- “We weren’t moving the puck quick enough,” said Tocchet. “Calgary, when they were behind, they had a heavy forecheck. Sometimes, we’ve got to move the puck and get it out, then chase the puck down. I think we were holding it too long and got stripped.”
- The Flames’ second goal looked like a clear mistake by Jake DeBrusk, as his man, Rasmus Andersson, stepped in from the point into the high slot and had all kinds of room to walk in and snipe the puck past Silovs. Tocchet, however, suggested the fault lay elsewhere. Parsing his words, it seems that Sprong overcommitted — “dove in” in Tocchet’s parlance — instead of “coming underneath” and switching checks with DeBrusk. If Sprong stays central and protects the guts of the ice, Andersson can’t walk in.
- “You’ve got to come underneath,” said Tocchet. “I don’t want to name the guy but if he just comes underneath, there’s no goal.”
- There’s a reason why Sprong only got four shifts for the rest of the game after that goal, which is a shame, as he was clearly finding some offensive chemistry with DeBrusk and Pettersson and made plenty of good plays in all three zones. He arguably could have had three assists in this game, as he made slick plays to set up several scoring chances, but Tocchet is not going to let a blown defensive assignment slide.
- When the Canucks took a 4-1 lead, I would have said a Calgary comeback was imPospisil but, to quote Kevin Garnett, anything is Pospisil. In case you haven’t guessed, Pospisil scored the Flames third goal. The Canucks got caught running around in their own end, which is ill-advised because they’re on ice, where skating is the preferred form of locomotion.
- I’m a little bit concerned about the defence pairing of Derek Forbort and Vincent Desharnais, who were brutally out-shot when they were on the ice at 5-on-5. Shot attempts were 13-to-6 for the Flames with Forbort on the ice and 17-to-9 with Desharnais, as they struggled to move the puck and looked, quite frankly, slow. It’s just one game but it’s also what a lot of people were worried about when it became clear that this was going to be their third pairing.
- Weegar tied the game on a long shot that Silovs really ought to have stopped, even if he couldn’t see it coming off the stick. Long shots through traffic seems to be the book on Silovs, which isn’t great, because those are some of the easiest shots to create. It would be nice if his weakness was something a little more complicated, like spin-o-rama blind backhand saucer passes through three defencemen’s legs to a 6’7” forward at the backdoor when the moon is in the seventh house on the third Friday of odd-numbered months.
- Nils Höglander nearly restored the lead two minutes later, sliding a rebound five-hole past Vladar, but defenceman Brayden Pachal was behind Vladar for some reason and blocked the shot. Defencemen don’t typically record shot blocks from behind their goaltender but I guess shooting percentage regression takes some strange forms.
- The Flames took the lead when Keifer Sherwood got caught too high in the zone. The Canucks had three forwards above the faceoff circles, leaving the Flames tons of space down low for Pachal to sneak down the right boards and fire a centring pass to Jonathan Huberdeau in the crease for the tap-in. I wish he Huberdidn't.
- It was a frustrating, listless performance by the Canucks but Hughes and Miller had one last thrill to give their home fans. Defending his empty net, Hughes blocked a shot by Mikael Backlund then fired a stretch pass ahead to Miller on the left wing. He stepped in and blasted a monstrous slap shot top corner over Vladar’s glove.
- The Flames finished things off in overtime, however. With Pospisil driving the net with Boeser in tow, Conor Zary went one-on-one with Filip Hronek and undressed him, then caught Silovs scrambling and tucked the puck in with a deke to the forehand. It was a brilliant goal but not a particularly good look for either Hronek or Silovs.
- It’s one game. One game. That’s it. That’s all. There will be no flipping of the pool after one game.
