There wasn’t much to cheer about for fans of the Vancouver Canucks on Thursday night against the Detroit Red Wings, so they cheered for shots on goal.
The Canucks gave them vanishingly few opportunities to even do that.
After their eighth-straight loss on Tuesday, the Canucks sounded demoralized, so one might hope they would be motivated to come out strong against the Red Wings to end that losing streak.
Instead, the Canucks quickly went down two-nothing early in the first period and never really recovered.
“It’s the same stuff game after game,” said a visibly upset Brock Boeser. “I don’t know where the disconnect is, if guys in here aren’t listening to what the coaches are preaching on our style of play, or if some of our structure is not working, or what it is.
“It’s embarrassing.”
7:02 into the first period, Elias Pettersson scored the Canucks’ first of two goals on their fifth shot of the game. That was the last Canucks shot on goal for a long, long time.
The Canucks went the entire second period without a shot. By the time the Red Wings scored their fifth goal of the game, four minutes into the third period, the Canucks were still stuck on five shots. The Red Wings could have played without a goaltender, and the score still would have been tied at that point.
“I mean, our compete is there, but we have to keep it going for a full 60 minutes,” said Filip Hronek. “Today, in the second, it was just not good enough. We have to focus on the small details and bring it every minute of the game.”
There was a false alarm in the final minute of the second period, when Linus Karlsson sent a puck through the crease that looked enough like a shot on goal that fans gave a Bronx cheer and the shot went up on the scoreboard.
Canucks Nation will never forget pic.twitter.com/RQjH7C5alz
— Wyatt Arndt (@TheStanchion) October 23, 2026
A moment later, the scorekeepers quietly took the shot away.
When Jake DeBrusk finally took a real shot on goal 6:16 into the third period, the fans gave a lusty Bronx cheer. It had been 39 minutes and 14 seconds of game time without a shot — over an hour and 42 minutes of real time, according to Sportsnet Stats.
Canucks went 1 hour, 42 minutes & 42 seconds of real time between shots on goal
— Sportsnet Stats (@SNstats) October 23, 2026
Partially fueled by The Larscheiders, the Canucks supporter group that was in the building, the fans cheered for each subsequent shot on goal like it was an overtime game-winning goal in the Stanley Cup Playoffs.
The players heard the cheers and, like the gas station attendant in Tommy Boy, picked up on the sarcasm.
“It’s well deserved for us,” said Drew O’Connor. “We didn’t give them anything to cheer for.”
“It’s a passionate market,” said Hronek. “It’s not fun for us to be on this side and losing, and I’m sure for fans it’s the same thing.”
“It’s embarrassing,” said Boeser. “We’re a way better hockey team than we’re playing. To consistently show up to the rink and be disconnected out there? We might have maybe played as a team — like a five-man unit out there — maybe a period here or there.
“I don’t know, we showed we were a better team last year than what we’re playing right now.”
By the end of the game, the Canucks had been outshot by a palindromic 31-13 margin. The lopsided game semeed to take a bite out of the good vibes that surrounded the team early in the season, as frustration boiled over.
“You can only talk to guys so many times about making the right play,” said Boeser. “It’s just frustrating. I know we have a lot better in this room, and I think everyone feels that. It’s just hard right now.”
With the loss, the Canucks are now where everyone predicted they would be: last in the NHL.
“This can’t happen to us,” said Hronek. “I have to be way better, and everyone in this room has to be way better too.”
The Los Angeles Kings and Calgary Flames, who were behind the Canucks in the standings heading into the night, both won their games, moving a point past the Canucks. They’re in last place, where they’re supposed to be as a tanking, rebuilding team.
But it would certainly be nice for them to lose in a more entertaining fashion than they did when I watched this game.
Silver linings and positive takeaways
- Even in a game as darkly cloudy as this one, there are silver linings for those who know where to look. You just had to look a little harder in this game.
- The biggest positive was the play of Jonathan Lekkerimäki, who picked up a point on both of the Canucks’ goals: a power-play assist and an even-strength goal. Lekkerimäki is now up to four goals and nine points, tied for first on the Canucks in goalscoring with Elias Pettersson and Paul Cotter and just behind Pettersson for second in points.
- That’s incredibly encouraging for Lekkerimäki, who is now on a 28-goal, 63-point pace for the season. Heading into this season, there were all kinds of question marks surrounding Lekkerimäki and whether he could transition his AHL scoring to the NHL level. So far, he’s erasing those question marks like a Gotham City graffiti clean-up crew after a crime spree by the Riddler.
Bob Frid/Imagn Images
- Elias Pettersson also scored a goal, keeping him at a point-per-game pace for the season with four goals and 12 points in 12 games. That’s nice.
- The penalty kill only allowed one goal on four Red Wings power plays, which increases their penalty kill percentage for the season from dreadful to still quite bad. Of course, they were helped by one of those power plays being just 11 seconds long at the very end of the game, but it still counts!
- That’s it. We’ve run out of silver linings.
Red Wings get all the goals they need in the first
- The Red Wings quickly put the Canucks behind the eight ball with two goals in the opening few minutes. On the first goal, Filip Hronek got caught puck-watching and abandoned the front of the net, leaving Lucas Raymond all alone to tip the puck past Kevin Lankinen.
- On the second goal, the Canucks got spun into oblivion like their tender hearts had been put in a blender by the Red Wings’ cycle. Seemingly every Canuck on the ice lost their man, leaving Lankinen swimming in his crease before William Wallinder banked the puck in off Lankinen’s skate.
- “If you look at the mistakes, a lot of them are effort-based,” said head coach Manny Malhotra. “As much as we want to talk about structure and being in the right place at the right time, when you don’t win battles, and you don’t box people out, and you allow the opposition to get to the paint, a lot of bad stuff is going to happen.”
- The Canucks answered back a minute later on the power play. Elias Pettersson’s first attempt at a one-timer sputtered, but he battled to win the puck back and, when Hronek set him up for another attempt, Pettersson got a lot more of the puck, sending it low and hard through John Gibson’s five-hole.
Sky view of EP40's 🚀 pic.twitter.com/nSQKKNtuM3
— Vancouver Canucks (@Canucks) October 23, 2026
- The Red Wings immediately replied with a power play goal of their own. The penalty kill diamond got pulled too high in the zone, leaving a 3-on-1 down low. Hronek took out Viktor Arvidsson in front of the net, but, like a separatist in Alberta, he was outnumbered, with Raymond jumping on the loose puck to pop it into the net.
“We’re constantly sitting back on our heels”
- The second period was a disaster. It’s somewhat surprising that the Canucks didn’t get a shot when it was a track meet early, with the play sprinting back and forth between the two ends of the ice, but it ultimately settled in the Canucks’ end of the ice.
- On the bright side, the Canucks only gave up one goal in the second period. Progress!
- Filip Chytil’s line got trapped in the defensive zone in the shift prior to the goal, and failed to get the puck in deep when they went for their line change, allowing the Red Wings to go right back on the offensive. The relentless pressure led to Michael Rasmussen tipping in a point shot as Victor Mancini failed to tie up his stick.
- “We have some bad changes, and we don’t set each other up [for success],” said Boeser, who slammed his stick into the boards after the goal. “It’s small details. All these things I’m talking about are little details of the game helping roll lines over and create momentum. I feel like we’re constantly sitting back on our heels, and they’re just coming down our throats.”
- Despite not facing a single shot on goal in the second period, John Gibson left the game with a reported upper-body injury and was replaced by rookie Michal Postava in his first NHL game.
“The effort level was a little disappointing tonight”
- Lankinen wasn’t to blame for this loss, but he didn’t help his cause with an embarrassing final goal against in the third period. As Emmitt Finnie burst past Max Sasson, Lankinen lost an edge and simply fell over, giving Finnie a wide-open net.
- The Canucks got one goal back in the third period, and it was a nice one. Coming up through the neutral zone, Marco Rossi made a smart cut to the middle of the ice, took a Zeev Buium pass, and burst into the offensive zone. Jonathan Lekkerimäki, who had quietly snuck in behind the defence, made a beeline for the back post, and Rossi found him with the puck for a tap-in goal.
At least Prime Time Lekkerimäki seems to be rounding out his game. Great work by Rossi to get in the zone and make a perfect pass, too. #Canucks pic.twitter.com/T4VYtaFG5k
— Lachlan Irvine (@LachInTheCrease) October 23, 2026
- It was a perfectly executed rush up the ice, as every player on the ice was in the right place at the right time to manipulate the shape of the Red Wings’ structure and open up gaps to be exploited. It was so perfectly executed that it just makes you wonder why they can’t do that more often.
- That kind of play also makes you wonder why Marco Rossi had just 9:38 in ice time, the lowest on the Canucks. But then you look at the underlying numbers and see that Rossi had the lowest corsi on the team at 11.8 per cent, as shot attempts were 15-to-2 for the Red Wings when he was on the ice at 5-on-5, and the decision to limit his ice time makes a little more sense.
- “It was kind of the way the game played out,” said Malhotra diplomatically when asked about Rossi’s ice time. “Just the way the lines rolled.”
- The Canucks have lost by larger margins this season, but this was absolutely the worst game for this group so far. Prior to this game, you could at least credit the Canucks for competing no matter how bad things got. Tonight? Not so much.
- “The effort level was a little disappointing tonight,” said Malhotra. “There were a couple of fits and spurts where we had some life and momentum, but for the most part it was an inability to sustain momentum, come up with pucks, win puck battles, kill plays in the D-zone — a lot of effort-based things that just weren’t there.”