The damage to the way people view the Vancouver Canucks in their current form was done long before this road trip even began.

And to the surprise of very few, this road trip has done nothing but make things worse.

The Canucks head into Buffalo for the fifth and final game of their Eastern road trip as losers of three straight after sneaking away with a 6-4 victory in Ottawa to kick off the trip.

There were no line rushes from morning skate tweeted out, but NHL.com Sabres correspondent Heather Engel tweeted that Spencer Martin was the first goalie off the ice for the Canucks, indicating that he’ll be Vancouver’s starter tonight.

Martin has started five of the Canucks’ last nine games and has a save percentage of .902 with an overall record of 3-1-1.

Another thing to note is that the club placed Jack Studnicka on the injured reserve this morning and called up Will Lockwood as a result.

We’ll have to wait until game time to find out if Lockwood is in and if Podkolzin — who exited Sunday vs. Boston after dropping the gloves with AJ Greer — will be in the lineup or not.

Based on this tweet from Dan Murphy, Podkolzin may not be an option tonight, which could open the door for Andrei Kuzmenko to get back into the lineup.

 

Like many of you, we’re in the “wait-and-see” portion of the season already, and don’t really care to hear the cliches players and coaches throw out about turning in a full effort. Rather, we’re going to watch this game. We’re probably going see things that we’ve seen them do in the 16 games prior. We’re going to have some fun in The Stanchies, no doubt.

But what matters more — what we’re really looking for — is what the Canucks’ management and ownership group do next. Industry chatter — and Jim Rutherford’s recent interviews — suggests that Bruce Boudreau is going to be let go, and the players are playing like it. They seem to be playing confused while waiting for — like all of us — some clarity on where the organization thinks its heading and what they’ll do next.

Because right now it feels like nobody knows, and if a coaching change with hopes of remaining competitive and turning this season around is all this organization has in mind, they better be prepared for entirely new levels of apathy to hit their fanbase.

Puck drop is at 4 PM Pacific tonight against the Buffalo Sabres as we wait and see what this organization has in store for the second year in a row.