LAS VEGAS — The Vancouver Canucks got back into the flow of regular season action after a lengthy break for the 4 Nations Face-Off, but couldn’t defeat the Vegas Golden Knights in an intense Pacific Division matchup on Saturday night.
Though the Canucks were able to grab an early lead, the Golden Knights took control of this game in the middle part of the contest. Kevin Lankinen was peppered with shots and scoring chances that ultimately broke through early in the second period when, at last, their shot volume broke in their favour on a fortunate bounce off of the end wall.
The Canucks got to their game and pressed hard in the third period, even beating Vegas netminder Adin Hill for two goals, but they were ruled off for goaltender interference. Unfortunately, the Canucks couldn’t quite find the legal equalizer, dropping their first game back by a final score of 3-1.
Here are three takeaways from a game that started slow and sloppy, but became intense and riveting as the players found their legs.
A sloppy start
For most of the players on both teams, it was the end of a multi-week break from NHL game reps. Yes, players not competing at the 4 Nations Face-Off have spent the past handful of days practicing, but both head coaches were working with Team Canada. And in any event, you can’t simulate the sharpness that comes from competing in multiple games from a preparedness and rhythm standpoint.
As a result, Saturday was a high-scoring day across the NHL. That wasn’t quite the case in Las Vegas, but some evidence of rust was apparent — especially for Vancouver, and especially in the opening 20 minutes.
In the first frame, on two separate occasions, some apparent miscommunication between Tyler Myers and Carson Soucy on line changes led to the Canucks being assessed a bench minor penalty for too many men on the ice. It’s extremely rare to be assessed a penalty on multiple line changes, and the Canucks had taken four bench minors all season going into the game.
Then, later on the in frame, Myers was assessed another penalty for delay of game when he put the puck over the glass from inside the Vancouver defensive zone. To his credit, with the clock winding down, Myers rushed into the defensive zone and killed a Vegas possession with a quality defensive play just before the whistle.
Nonetheless, Myers’ eventful first period made him something of a poster boy for the sloppiness that defined the return of Canucks regular season hockey — and the subject of fodder on Hockey Night in Canada too.
why did the commentators just have to absolutely roast Tyler Myers like that lmao pic.twitter.com/PmfK2ClzZy
— inside jokes (@ambiguousanimal) February 23, 2025
Lankinen gives Vancouver a shot
Fresh off of signing his new five-year $22.5 million contract, Lankinen was superb and gave the Canucks an opportunity to hang around in this game.
Because the truth is that the Canucks were largely outclassed by the Golden Knights — especially from the second period on.
After a bit of a stilted, slow-paced start in which the Golden Knights were wasteful on the power play, the Canucks took a 1-0 lead in the second period off Jake DeBrusk’s 20th goal of the season. From that point on, the puck was magnetized to Vancouver’s defensive end.
The Golden Knights — for about 15 minutes spanning the latter stages of the second frame and the first five minutes of the third — set up shop in Vancouver’s end. They directed a dizzying number of high-quality looks, deflections, shots off passes into the inner slot and a couple of quality looks off of the rush at the Canucks’ newly signed starter. And for the most part, Lankinen stood tall.
It took a deft Ivan Barbashev deflection and a fortunate bounce off of the end boards to Brandon Saad to beat Lankinen. Otherwise, he was completely dialed in.
As Lankinen has often done for the Canucks this season, he gave the team an opportunity that their form in the game didn’t earn.
Now, with the club facing the Utah Hockey Club in the second leg of a key road back-to-back on Sunday, the Canucks are going to have a difficult decision on their hands. They can’t afford to drop two points to Utah, and Lankinen was enormously busy in Las Vegas. Rick Tocchet suggested that would play a role in determining whether the club would utilize Lankinen in both legs of the back-to-back games.
What worked and what didn’t for Vancouver
At even strength, frankly, the Canucks got creditable performances from most of their skaters.
The Filip Chytil line, for example, was Vancouver’s most potent attacking game, using their speed to generate several decent looks on the rush throughout the evening. If Chytil’s shooting accuracy had been slightly tighter, it could’ve been a banner night for the still relatively new Canucks pivot.
On the back end meanwhile, Filip Hronek was a standout in a 1A role as Quinn Hughes continues to miss games. He handled business extremely well in both ends and led all Canucks skaters in ice time by a wide margin.
Where the Canucks had a few issues in terms of the pace of this game was on the fourth line. While Nils Höglander scored a third-period goal, which was ultimately ruled goaltender interference, Vancouver’s fourth line was the club’s soft underbelly — and one that the Golden Knights were able to exploit territorially.
As it stands, the Canucks feel to be short a couple of good middle-six forwards, especially when this team’s roster construction and overall logic require forward depth to be a meaningful strength. It’s something to consider as the trade deadline approaches, and as discussion heats up around a pair of pending unrestricted free agents — Brock Boeser and Pius Suter — and what their Canucks future should look like.
(Photo of Ivan Barbashev of Vegas scoring against Vancouver’s Kevin Lankinen: Stephen R. Sylvanie / Imagn Images)
