The Vancouver Canucks’ struggles to score have head coach Willie Desjardins desperate for answers. Following Vancouver’s 1-0 shutout loss to the Ottawa Senators on Thursday, the third-year coach said his squad needs to come out with more urgency and start putting up results.
“We have to score. We can’t feel okay anymore that we had chances. We have to have more urgency to our game,” Desjardins said following the Canucks latest loss.
"We again created enough chances for a few goals. It's only game 11 and we're frustrated, but we'll work through it." – Henrik Sedin
— Vancouver Canucks (@Canucks) November 4, 2016
[link_box id=”22277″ site_id=”17″ layout=”link-box-third” alignment=”alignright”]It’s hard to believe, but Vancouver has scored just two goals in their past five games – all coming in a 5-2 loss to Washington. The Canucks’ anemic offensive production is cause for concern with the club getting shutout four times in that span. Desjardins’ squad started off hot, winning four straight to start 2016-17, but since have gone bone-chillingly cold losing seven straight games.
#Canucks goals period by period last 5 games:
0+0+0+0+0+0+1+1+0+0+0+0+0+0+?
two six-period droughts in past 10 days— Jeff Paterson (@patersonjeff) November 4, 2016
The blame for Vancouver’s rough patch can be solely placed on the team’s offense. The Canucks’ defense is passable, allowing the fifth-fewest shots against per sixty at even strength (26.95) while Jakob Markstrom (.920 Sv%) and Ryan Miller (.934 Sv%) performed adequately thus far.
Only eight different players have scored goals for Vancouver. Prized offseason acquisition Loui Eriksson is goalless despite averaging nearly 20 minutes of ice time. The 30-year-old has played with little confidence that won’t rise after being pushed off the Twins line and paired with Brandon Sutter and Mark Granlund.
Meanwhile, Vancouver’s bottom-six is a complete disaster. Jack Skille, Alex Burrows, Derek Dorsett, Jake Virtanen, Brendan Gaunce and Sven Baertschi have all failed to score. Outside Bo Horvat, who leads the Canucks with four goals, Vancouver’s third and fourth line have done nothing offensively. The group shouldn’t be dynamic offensively, but icing two lines incapable of scoring is hugely problematic.
Keeping with the no-goal theme, the Canucks’ defensive unit has only scored twice. A group featuring Lucas Sbisa and Erik Gudbranson isn’t going to set the world on fire, but without a quarterback at the point, the Canucks’ power play has been lit out, ranking dead last league-wide at 8.6%.
The Canucks have been hard pressed. Shooting 5.44% in all situations doesn’t help and will eventually uptick, but, the depth issues will prevent a complete 180. There’s simply not enough talent to be a competitive team. Not helping the matters is Desjardins, at times, bizarre deployment.
Dorsett & Sbisa out for #Canucks in final minute with goalie pulled
— Jeff Paterson (@patersonjeff) November 4, 2016
Canucks GM Jim Benning is responsible for a majority of the team’s offensive woes. He opted to fill an aging team, desperately in need of a rebuild with both unproven and broken parts.
He outbid himself to sign mediocre players like Derek Dorsett (four-year, $10.6 million), Jack Skille (one-year, $700K) and Lucas Sbisa to (three-year) $10.8 million. Benning failed to provide depth. Alternatively, he could have pursued Kris Versteeg, Brandon Pirri or even Cory Conacher for little cost. The Canucks would then have depth and save money, instead of having one two functioning lines and a suffocated cap.
Benning still aims to fix the problem by using more assets to get scoring help – a tactic which has previously failed to help.
https://twitter.com/CanucksNow/status/794290666633211904
The Canucks BADLY need to rebuild and as long as Jim Benning is the man pulling the strings behind the curtain, the organization is doomed. Vancouver will start finding the net, but their fate, like their roster, isn’t pretty.
