Sometimes, the stars take matters into their own hands.

The Vancouver Canucks took home a 2-1 win against the league-leading Washington Capitals. It wasn’t the most convincing thing in the world, but it was a win, and the Canucks had to hold down a lead for the majority of the game against a furious onslaught by the Caps. That is an achievement, given how the last couple of lead situations went for Vancouver, and getting a fantastic performance from the depth to supplement an electric Quinn Hughes was apparently all this team needed. However, it also really underlines the inconsistency that this team suffers through.

Here’s the win, by the numbers.

As always, you can find our glossary guide of advanced stats here.

The first two periods were a pretty even battle. Washington and Vancouver took turns trading slight advantages in both Corsi and expected goals in a pretty back-and-forth tilt. After the last stretch of games for the Canucks, a game like this through two periods was honestly quite the accomplishment. However, the third saw the Capitals crank it up a notch, looking to equalize and win this game on the road. Their CF% of 66.67 and xGF% of 88.31 showed just what kind of effort they were putting up to get themselves level, but unfortunately for them, they ran out of time.

The heat map once again favoured the opposition, but at least it wasn’t as bad as previous outings. Washington dominated the scoring chances to the tune of 29-18 at 5v5, but only managed a 10-7 edge in high-danger chances against the Canucks. Proportionally, that is a pretty darn good defensive performance by Vancouver to limit the grade-A chances that they faced. As for themselves, the Canucks didn’t get a ton of chances but a good chunk of them were registered a high-danger. Again, proportionally, it’s a fine job at even strength especially considering the quality of their opposition. Both teams managed just 1 high-danger chance for on their powerplays, while the Caps added another one in the dying moments of the game.

Corsi Champ: Phil Di Giuseppe put up pretty good numbers for going up against Alex Ovechkin for the majority of the night. The depth winger racked up a team-best 62.50 CF% playing against the greatest goal-scorer of this generation, managing to only be on ice for 1 high-danger chance against while directing 2 high-danger chances for on the Capitals net. While his contributions weren’t massive, it was still pretty darn good to help buffer the momentum for the Canucks, chipping in shift by shift with good metrics and making sure Washington couldn’t get much going.

Corsi Chump: Well, it’s not going to be all sunshine and rainbows for the rookie. Elias Pettersson the defenceman brought up the rear of the Corsi department for the Canucks last night, putting up 23.53 CF% while playing alongside Vincent Desharnais. Probably not the best of partners to be with as a rookie, but that’s just how the cookie crumbled. Pettersson finished with the second-lowest xGF% of 14.28, a team-low 0.06 xGF to his name while being on ice for a 1-8 scoring chance deficit. However, a bright spot was that only one of those chances was considered high danger, which, all things considered, isn’t a terrible outcome.

xGF: PDG pulled out another category by leading the Canucks with his 68.78 xGF%. A lot of that does have to do with the fact that he recorded the team’s third-best xGA of 0.22, managing to hold off Ovechkin and company from doing too much damage during his time on ice. In terms of raw xGF, it was none other than Quinn Hughes who scored both goals for the Canucks, leading them with a 0.95 xGF at 5v5 play. His numbers did suffer as a result of the 1.14 xGA he faced, but that comes with the territory of playing against the Caps’ best players for huge chunks of time.

GSAx: Honestly, the Canucks might need to give the reins to Kevin Lankinen for a while. The Finn tallied an impressive performance, facing down 2.83 xGF and coming out with a 1.83 GSAx. That’s a huge contribution, to take away nearly two full goals against from the Capitals. The only goal that got past him was a high-danger shot, and Lankinen was perfect from everywhere else. It was a very necessary performance too, as with just two goals of run support, the man between the pipes had to stand tall.

Make this make sense: JT Miller did not have a good game. Actually, he had probably one of the worst games amongst Canuck forwards defensively. Facing down a team-high 1.64 xGA, Miller was on ice for a 9-11 deficit in scoring chances and 3-8 high-danger chance hole. It’s not the best look, especially considering that there wasn’t much offensive contribution to speak of either. And then, considering that the opposition he mostly played against consisted of Aliaksei Protas, Connor McMichael, and Pierre-Luc Dubois, Miller’s numbers really aren’t pretty at all. At the very least, he came up with a big block at the end of the game, but it shouldn’t outweigh the larger sample size.

Where Forbort-Soucy… kinda worked?: This one was surprising to see on the stat sheet. Iced against the Capitals’ top 6 for the entire night, Derek Forbort and Carson Soucy managed to keep things pretty tidy. It wasn’t spectacular, but the pair put up 42.31 CF% and 48.75 xGF%, holding their opposition to just 3 high-danger chances all night. Considering the quality of opponent and their deployment all night, it’s impressive. The former Fighting Hawk and Bulldog have been on quite the rollercoaster this year in terms of performance, so it’s nice to see numbers like these when possible.

The Canucks weren’t the most convincing last night, but put up a good fight and battle to get the result regardless. That sort of edge and bite and fightback has been noticeably absent this year, and it is a wonder why that it only surfaced now. Vancouver has been incredibly inconsistent and for whatever reason, manages to pull together to beat one of the best teams in the league. Not many will complain about the result – but the process before and leading up to this victory is definitely something to be examined.

Vancouver heads into St. Louis tomorrow to take on the Blues.