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The Stanchies: Curtis Douglas’ first NHL goal highlights Canucks’ stunning overtime win over Ducks
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Photo credit: © Corinne Votaw-Imagn Images
Lachlan Irvine
Apr 13, 2026, 12:02 EDTUpdated: Apr 13, 2026, 12:39 EDT
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The Vancouver Canucks’ late-season surge has FINALLY arrived. Only this time, it won’t affect their draft stock, so absolutely everyone is happy about it.
The Canucks have looked like a different team over the last couple of games. After a pretty listless performance against a desperate Kings team on Thursday, we all expected them to turn in similar results against the equally determined Sharks and Ducks, both fighting for their playoff lives. But the California sun appears to have given the Canucks a tan and some rejuvenation, because they put together two of their best performances on back-to-back nights in the Golden State. Their first time winning two games in a row since December, by the way!
This game was the story of opportunistic play and key players stepping up. Curtis Douglas got two-thirds of the way to a Gordie Howe hat trick. Kirill Kudryavstev immediately made an impact in his first NHL game of the season. Jake DeBrusk and Brock Boeser built upon being the team’s lone 20-goal scorers. Marco Rossi ripped in the overtime winner, and Nikita Tolopilo stood on his head when called upon to pull the Canucks to two points.
In the grand scheme of this season or the Canucks’ future, this game won’t be remembered for long. But in a season full of so few happy stories, fans will want to hang onto this victory for as long as our collective memories will allow. There’s a real chance it will be the last win of this chapter in Canucks history, before a new one is set to start in the offseason.
Whether or not this contributes to spoiling a team’s playoff hopes doesn’t matter. For one shining night, these 2025-26 Canucks had fun. And after 79 games of frustration, I’d say they earned it.
Let’s start off the last week of the season by making some GIF money.
Best Tone Setter
Radko Gudas hasn’t gotten enough of his villain arc recently. It took him only a few minutes to throw a massive shoulder check on Liam Öhgren in the neutral zone.
But for whatever reason, Teddy Blueger came into this game especially locked in, and he made a 99 B-Line for Gudas to give him a stern telling off for it.
I’m gonna say something, and you’re not allowed to get mad, okay? Alright.
Is this a hit that warrants challenging a guy to fight? I’d say no. It’s shoulder on shoulder. Öhgren was no worse for wear. If you challenge every guy to a fight who throws a slightly big hit, you’ll be in the box the entire night.
But I also get why people think it was worth the hassle! Gudas has a history, and the Canucks have been accused of not being tough enough on opponents for chippy play. And Blueger isn’t the first name you’d expect to be picking a fight with the NHL’s most notorious, but respect to him for stepping up in that moment, even if he got immediately thrown into the box for a cross-check after.
Best Just Another Night
The Ducks’ power play has some potent options at their disposal, and it really didn’t take them long to catch the Canucks’ penalty kill off guard for a scoring chance.
Beckett Sennecke had all the net in the world to shoot at on this odd-man rush. But he underestimated the power of Nikita Tolopilo.
That massive stretch across robbed Sennecke of the opening goal, and you’d hope would wake up the Canucks defenders to who was getting open behind their coverage. It didn’t.
Instead, Cutter Gauthier snuck to the back door right as Blueger’s penalty was expiring, and Aatu Räty didn’t pick him up as Chris Krieder hopped on a rebound and whacked it to the far side.
I’m no coach, but I’d generally advise against leaving a guy with 38 goals that wide open. Now he’s at 39 (though you should make a note of that for later).
Best Knighting
This might’ve been the highlight of the entire season. For the players on the ice, it certainly looked like one.
First off, we have to note who’s out there. Curtis Douglas is back in the lineup, Kirill Kudryavtsev is skating with the big club for the first time this season, and Ty Mueller is out for his fourth game of the year.
Mueller enters the zone with the puck and drops it to Kudryavtsev, who lets a shot go through the sea of Ducks flying through the zone. Somehow, the puck evades all the orange jerseys in front of the net except Lukas Dostal’s, and the rebound seemingly takes a bounce off Aatu Räty before bouncing right to Ser Douglas for his first National Hockey League goal.
Look at that celebration. Everyone’s acting like they just scored a playoff series winner. This is what hockey’s all about.
And that wasn’t even the only first on the play. Kudryavtsev’s secondary assist marked the first point of his NHL career! They might have to saw that puck in half.
Best Round Deux

Atta boy Blueger #Canucks

— Bruce Reding (@sledgeguy16.bsky.social) 2026-04-13T00:36:51.734Z

Teddy Blueger didn’t get his fight with Gudas the first time. But on the second attempt, Radko obliged.
It wasn’t the most graceful fight you’ve ever seen, but safe to say Teddy landed the best set of punches — winner by judge’s decision.
Best Unbeatable
Remember when it seemed like no Canucks were going to reach the 20-goal plateau this season? Or when the Canucks power play could only be described as ‘anemic’? Jake DeBrusk has solved both of those problems.
Marco Rossi takes a shot through a break in the Ducks’ PK formation, with DeBrusk waiting in his most dangerous spot: in front of the net with his stick ready for a deflection. The shot’s low, but Jake’s stick is perfectly placed to redirect the puck back to the short side so succinctly that Dostal is still sliding to his left as it moves past his right.
Whenever that happens as a goalie, the puck seems to move by you into the net in slow motion. You just brace for the goal light to come on.
Best Gordie How?
I’m not sure anyone expected this Canucks/Ducks matchup to turn into a bit of a fight night. But the first period had some intense scuffles and two separate fights on the menu. After Blueger and Gudas served as the appetizer, Curtis Douglas and Jeffery Viel were the main course.
I gave Douglas some heat for his underwhelming first bout with Adam Klapka in Calgary a few weeks ago; this was a TOTAL improvement. Far less circling his opponent, and punches actually landed! Now that was worth the heavyweight billing.
Best Tolo Time
The 2025-26 Canucks taking a lead into the second period is like throwing chum into piranha-infested waters. You’re expecting to see the water turn very red. But that wasn’t the case tonight, thanks to a Herculean effort by Nikita Tolopilo.
Look at the way he stares down Gauthier on a 2-on-1 and calmly snags the shot — just another day at the office for Niki T.
Then, when Mikael Granlund took the Canucks for a merry-go-round before backhanding a pass to a streaking Sennecke, Tolo was right there to swallow the puck up.
The only real scrambly play of the second for Tolo came thanks to some great Ducks passing on an odd-man rush, but even then, he battled for his life as his defenders covered for him in time.
Tolopilo was frustrating the Ducks so much that by the third period, Ian Moore was trying to sweep his leg on him like Johnny Lawrence on Daniel LaRusso.
Given how this game is going and how his last start here went, Honda Center is quickly becoming a lucky building for Tolopilo.
Best New Role
Brock Boeser is a god damn penalty killer. Imagine that.
After a delay of game penalty by Drew O’Connor, it looked like the Ducks were about to find their window to take over the game. Instead, on a rare PK shift, Boeser made John Carlson pay for a puck bobble.
Boeser doesn’t need speed to find success on a breakaway. He takes a slow and methodical approach before tucking a top-shelf puck beautifully over Dostal’s glove. You’ve gotta love this guy when he’s at his best.
I know what team I’m watching, but I can’t help but feel like this is the dagger in the Ducks’ hearts. Surely they won’t flip this two-goal deficit into a surprising comeback, right?
Best Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride
A young team like Anaheim is usually prone to losing control of a game like this one and falling apart. But unfortunately, you have to hand it to them: they didn’t even let the power play lapse before getting back in the driver’s seat.
Cutter Gauthier is locked and loaded when Jackson LaCombe puts the puck on a tee for him. Tolopilo can’t slam the five-hole shut in time, and Anaheim has life.
Gauthier reaches the 40-goal mark for the first time in his career, which is just four points shy of his entire career high last year.
Best Car Toon Spin
I mean, we all saw this coming right?
The only thing that shocked me was just how quickly the tide turned. It only took about two minutes for a Fil Hronek clearing attempt to take a weird bounce off the glass and bounce right to Chris Kreider.
Kreider snapped it on goal, a surprised Tolopilo kicked it out, but Leo Carlsson had avaded defensive coverage and was ready to tuck in the rebound.
All Tolopilo could do was swim for it as a sound wave rippled through The Pond. “WE WANT PLAYOFFS!” was replaced by the screaming usually reserved for the theme park coasters down the street.
Ah well. It looked like the Canucks were about to finally win back-to-back games for the first time in the calendar year, and maybe take a huge chunk out of the Ducks’ postseason hopes. But that was probably asking too much after winning in San Jose on Saturday. Just taking this game to overtime is success enough for these Canucks.
Best Relentlessness
3-on-3 overtime is a format that rewards young, speedy teams the most. The Ducks are hungry to get that second point and secure their playoff spot, so it’s only a matter of time before they seal this game…
…is what I WOULD say, if not for Fil Hronek and Drew O’Connor turning the extra frame right on its head.
First, Hronek managed to pinch at the right time for a short breakaway that Dostal managed to sweep away. Possession back to the Ducks, until Run-DOC stripped Sennecke of the puck at the blue line and forced Kreider to take a slashing penalty.
With the crowd on the edge of their seats, the Canucks ripped seven shots at Dostal’s net in overtime. Just as the power play was expiring, Buium and Marco Rossi, having clearly watched Gauthier’s second goal on the benchside iPads, linked up for a near-identical game-winner.
Ohhhh baby, you could’ve heard a PIN DROP after the puck made it through Dostal’s wickets. The Canucks pour off the bench, and all of a sudden, Vancouver has won both parts of a back-to-back and spoiled the party for yet another Pacific Division rival.
Also worth mentioning, the secondary assist? That was courtesy of Liam Öhgren, giving us the full Minnesota Connection™.
Sometimes being last is pretty fun.
Best Axe Thrower
They should give Curtis Douglas that axe when the season is officially done. He gives off very obvious lumberjack vibes; it just looks right with him.
Best Final Thoughts
If you’d told me when I’d started out writing about hockey back in 2014 that I’d one day have the chance to write the spiritual successor to the Provies, I wouldn’t have believed you. The fact that I got to write over a quarter of them this season is quite literally a dream come true, and it’s not lost on me how lucky I am to be backing up Wyatt on these and continuing a legacy started by Jason Botchford over a decade ago.
This year has certainly been a difficult season to write for, but that doesn’t mean there haven’t been parts that have made it worth it. Making the pregame videos has given me an opportunity to put my own stamp on this series. Hopefully, you enjoyed the added bonus my starts brought on top of the articles themselves.
I’ve learned more this year about being a hockey reporter than in any other over the last decade. I’ve covered two pro teams simultaneously, talked to more players and coaches than I can count, and even helped name a Canucks line! And none of that would’ve been possible without you for reading these every week.
Next season will present new challenges, new stories and, hopefully, a brand new exciting era. And you better believe, as long as Wyatt has me, I’ll be back here writing about it.
Out of all the things I’ve been fortunate enough to do covering this team, I’ve never been able to write about a true Cup contender in this town, or a fanbase that gets to truly believe in the direction their team is headed. I know you’ll get that team eventually, and I sure hope that chapter begins in May.
There’s a mountain the Canucks have to climb ahead. One can only dream what the view from the peak will look like.
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