Royally Ducked: Canucks drop 4-2 decision to Anaheim

-…yeah, pretty much (Photo via Jeff Vinnick/Getty Images)

It was long, depressing and boring, and Ricky Gervais wasn’t even around to save the day. The Canucks came home from a four-game road trip and looked lifeless through two periods, generating nothing offensively, and allowing an inferior hockey team to walk all over them at home ice. For analysis, statistical three stars, and a scoring chance recap, click past the jump.

-First things first. The Canucks were out-chanced 16-11, 12-7 at even strength and 4-0 at 5-on-5 with the score tied.

-The Canucks were pretty bad over their road trip, earning a 42.7% score-tied Corsi rate. Despite winning 3-of-4, this isn’t what we expect out of the Canucks, who are usually a sound possession team. After last night’s ugly loss to Anaheim, the Canucks drop to a 41.5% rate over their last five games. A lot of people may overlook those numbers, but score-tied Corsi is the best measure of how good a hockey team is. The Canucks got their comeuppance last night for how poorly they’ve played, and it doesn’t get much easier this week, playing Los Angeles and San Jose, who are both very good hockey teams.

-Aaron Rome may have had his worst game ever. While a lot of commentators will note his minus-3, his minus-6 chance differential was particularly bad. He completely whiffed the blocked shot attempt that led to a couple of rebounds and the first Ducks goal. The Canucks earned three chances against on that play simply because Roberto Luongo made a couple of strong saves. If he allows the first one, perhaps Aaron Rome’s numbers don’t look quite so bad.

-This was David Booth’s first game back in the lineup. Normally a possession machine, leading the Canucks in most Corsi categories, Booth had a very modest game at even strength by his standards, going minus-3 in chances and minus-4 in shot differential. He did, however, create a couple of chances on his own on a powerplay in the second period.

-About midway through the game, the Canucks had only three shots on net. John Garrett said something to the effect of “well, they’ve also had a lot of attempts blocked”. John Shorthouse didn’t seem to buy the argument, but props to Garrett for mentioning something along the lines of Corsi during a Sportsnet broadcast. For the record, Vancouver trailed Anaheim all game as far as shot attempts at even strength go.

-The Canucks had a lot of chances-at-chances tonight, but pucks were bouncing over sticks and the Ducks were blocking a lot of shots. This just wasn’t their night.

-Roberto Luongo could have stolen the game for the Canucks, but didn’t. He didn’t finish with a quality start and looked pretty bleak on the first Jason Blake goal. One thing is sure, though, he certainly wasn’t the problem in this one.

-I usually do the “Statistical Three Stars”, but when I put all the information into a spreadsheet from tonight’s game, the leading Canucks were the fourth liners who didn’t see a whole lot of minutes. Given the dud of a performance they put up, I instead decided to run the “Three Goats” or “The Reverse Statistical Three Stars” to highlight some of the worst performances on the team:

1 – Aaron Rome: No brainer.

2 – Jannik Hansen: Minus-2 in chances, didn’t see a lot of tough minutes, and allowed two chances on the penalty kill in just 1:40 of play.

3 – Manny Malhotra: He’s been playing better as of late, but had a rough one here, having a bad night on the PK and not contributing anything offensively (he was the only Canuck with a shot attempt). Also, what’s this deal with not going to the bench to pick up a stick after its been broken? Better for the team to be down 5-on-3 for a couple of seconds than for Malhotra to be completely lost without a stick for a thirty. This led to Anaheim’s fourth goal, since Malhotra couldn’t block a pass from Bobby Ryan to Luca Sbisa.

-Anything I’ve neglected to mention that you noticed, let me know in the comments.