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The Stanchies: Canucks fight their way to another spirited near comeback, lose 5-4 to Ducks
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Photo credit: Bob Frid-Imagn Images
The Stanchion
Nov 4, 2026, 02:55 ESTUpdated: Nov 4, 2026, 03:27 EST
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Despite another round of third period heroics, the Vancouver Canucks failed in their bid to secure a second comeback victory against the Anaheim Ducks. Led by Cutter Gauthier’s second hat trick of the season, the Ducks walked away with a 5-4 victory over the hometown Canucks, despite the 5-2 lead almost falling in familiar fashion as it did earlier in the season in Anaheim.
Games against the Anaheim Ducks are always fun because defence isn’t really on the schedule? Vancouver is trying to figure out what a defensive structure looks like, while Anaheim doesn’t care what a defensive structure looks like, which leads to some pretty exciting contests. Give me this over a rebuilding team grinding out a 2-1 loss with under 20 shots any day of the week.
Perhaps knowing they have the best Hometown Remix jerseys of the batch helped the Joel Quenville-led team have the confidence to lock down the game. Or maybe it was Anaheim’s red-hot power play going three for three on the night that did it. To be fair, the Canucks power play got two goals of their own, and by my account, the game was incredibly close. Dare I say the Canucks might have deserved a better fate on this night?
Which brings us to Kevin Lankinen, whose .773 save percentage on the night is going to garner a lot of attention, as it should. It was another game in which you felt like you were watching a man who doesn’t trust his team or himself, often times seemingly guessing at saves. At one point, he leaned and slid out of position on the Ducks’ fifth goal so early it was like he was begging Gauther to put him out of his misery. Tell him about the rabbits, Cutter. About how you’re going to live off the fat of the land.
All you can do is feel bad for him at that point, as his journey out of this is entirely in his own hands. Such is the life of the lonely goalie. It just feels like every decision he seems to make is the wrong one, so you’d be forgiven if you’re curious about how he’s going to pull himself out of this mental spiral. Time off as Leevi Meriläinen takes the bulk of the games is great; you can go dial things in during practice, but at the end of the day you’re going to have to fight through this in-game somehow; A steeper hill made steeper by the fact Leevi isn’t giving many reasons not to play him heavily.
To Anaheim’s credit, this is a top-10 offence in the league, with a power play currently battling the Utah Mammoth for the top spot. The last time the Ducks didn’t score more than five goals in a game was back on October 22, in a 4-1 loss to the New Jersey Devils, so giving up goals to them is kind of how it goes.
And being scored on by Leo Carlsson and Cutter Gauthier is nothing to be ashamed about. Maybe Mikael Granlund scoring should cause a bit of unease and sadness, but scoring against Vancouver is also oddly his kink in life. The team he scores his highest goals per game against? You guessed it, the Canucks. Which would have been weird had it been another team after I set it up like that.
The point is, it still would have been nice if Kevin had made a game-saving stop on just one of those goals. It’s been a while since it feels like Lankinen kept the Canucks in a game long enough for them to win it, which I get; that’s a big ask for any goalie with this team. But at the end of the day, it’s a results-oriented business, and right now Lankinen is struggling mightily, while Leevi is at the very least giving his team chances to secure a victory on occasion.
The good news for Vancouver is they had some five-on-five success in this game, in terms of producing shifts that actually resembled competent offence, complete with successful passing. The power play, as mentioned, also looked good, with quick puck movement and generating dangerous looks on net. Jake DeBrusk awoke for his annual November hot streak, one you could see coming a mile away. It had been several games in a row of him finding ways to dash to the net, so you knew it was just a matter of time until it started going his way. Elias Pettersson also picked up two assists, which should keep the arguments about whether he is back or not going for another couple of days around here.
In terms of some negatives not related to goaltending, I will say it was another game in which Zeev Buium has concerned me with his defensive zone coverage. I understand being a shutdown guy is never going to be his thing, but when he isn’t able to activate his offensive game, he needs to at least limit some of the bigger mistakes he makes in his own end to a higher degree than he currently does. I am seeing some sparks here and there of him trying to figure things out with his puck movement and trying to activate in the offensive zone, but right now his game feels a bit middling.
Overall, though, it was a perfectly reasonable game. Good entertainment, plenty of fights, kept the crowd into it most of the night, and got close to tying the game up…for tank enthusiasts, this one had everything but Dan Cortez.
Let’s jump into the breakdown.
Best off ice news
It was Diwali Night against the Ducks, giving us a glorious rendition of the Skate jersey. It also gave us some Movember-ready Canucks, and I wish the social media team had coordinated a moustache reveal where players walked in the room and then children started screaming when they didn’t recognize them.
Fil Hronek was clearly the biggest change, as his glorious beard gave way to a moustache that suggests while he himself hasn’t murdered someone, that doesn’t mean he doesn’t know somebody who has. I also can’t be sure he isn’t the local repair guy in a small town in North Yorkshire, whose use of duct tape is legendary.
Another bit of news was the late announcement that Tom Willander was out due to a lower-body injury, ranging from anything between sore knees to “lost legs in an attempt to beat the Sedins Grouse Grind record.” This meant the Canucks Daryl Dixon, Guillaume Brisebois, got another NHL game under his belt. It will be the year 2034, and I just know Guillaume Brisebois will be taking a shift in the playoffs as the Canucks reach the second round for the first time in over a decade.
Best sign of things to come
Jake DeBrusk started the game off quickly by generating his DoorDash delivery attempt right off the hop, but was defended well by Drew Helleson, leading to a dribbler of a shot:
Still, you can see the vision. Jake has been generating rushes like this almost every game over the last few weeks, so you could see things coming together for him. He has also been really good at setting up shop in the crease, so this was very clearly a stretch of hockey where you could appreciate his work, even if the results weren’t point-heavy. It’s like when you meant to take the garbage out but forgot versus piling up more garbage on top of the full can. You can get behind one of those processes and know it will pay off eventually.
Unfortunately for Vancouver, they ran into a DMZ Lieutenant in the form of a Ducks power play, which put the Canucks down 1-0 rather quickly:
The Canucks diamond/square/rhombus formation pretty clearly lost its integrity due to the Ducks whipping the puck around, but it still feels a bit jarring to see Mikael Granlund that wide open in the bumper spot among all the Canucks defenders. Beckett Sennecke got his first of four assists on this tally, and I swear to God every Ducks goal was him just playing give-and-go on every play. This strategy went undefeated on the night, for reasons. Bees? Bees.
And like many of the goals on the night, you can see that Kevin Lankinen was in a spot where he had to make a high-danger save, but failed to do so. It makes sense Anaheim is scoring in these spots, but you still want him to make a save or two if possible. Even his reaction after the save was an awkward movement, and it’s so hard not to hyper-analyze everything he does in net. I can only imagine how loud it is inside his own head at this point.
Best good Canadian kid
Jacob Quillan played around twelve minutes in his Canucks debut against the Leafs last Saturday, and while he was perfectly cromulent, nothing really stood out? Which, as the old adage goes, is probably a good thing for a bottom roster player? Better to be a Milford Man versus the guy setting the Banana Stand on fire.
Against the Ducks, though, he had a far more memorable night in the form of two fights, which I don’t think many people saw coming, himself included.
The first fight was after Quillan laid out Pavel Mintyukov with a perfectly clean and legal hit in the corner:
Roger McQueen, however, followed “The Code,” which means you must fight anyone who dares besmirch your team’s name, via a hit or written word. So he dropped the mitts with Dartmouth’s favourite son and was handed an extra penalty as a result of said fight.
The end result? Paul Cotter set up shop in front of the net on the power play, leading to a bit of a puck scramble in front of Duck’s goalie Laurent Brossoit, ending with Marco Rossi making a smart pass over to Liam Öhgren for essentially an empty net to shoot on:
This continues the trend of the Canucks having a second unit on the power play that actually looks decent? Again, I am used to the Sedins taking up almost the entire two minutes before going for a rest while Aaron Volpatti and Tanner Glass dutifully trot out there to make sure they don’t give up a breakaway to the guy coming out of the penalty box. It’s nice to see the Canucks have some options when it comes to the extra man.
And this seemed to energize Vancouver, as Guillaume Brisebois would come inches away from making it 2-1 under a minute later:
Daryl Dixon hits the post, but Elias Pettersson keeps working hard on the puck, leading to another point shot that EP40 almost gets a piece of, ending with Brock Boeser sending a back-hander high and wide, but you know he saw daylight there. He had room up in that corner where Mom keeps the power of attorney hidden away from your sister.
The first period honestly had a lot of good habits on display, and it might have been their most complete period of the season in that regard.
The Canucks have struggled with good board support to start the season, so it was nice when a couple of minutes later you had Jonathan Lekkerimäki coming in along the glass to help out in his own end, facilitating a zone exit with puck possession, ultimately leading to a nice one-timer attempt from Prime Time to end the shift:
Lekkerimäki didn’t panic with the puck on his stick in his own end; he didn’t just sky it through the air to get rid of it at the first sight of stranger danger; instead, he kept his composure and skated with the puck until he could transfer ownership of the puck to Defensively Aroused Elias Pettersson, all of which generated a shot on net. It just felt like a clean period. The Canucks weren’t chasing the entire game; they actually had breakouts that looked normal and didn’t make you subconsciously reach for your extra-strength Probiotics.
Despite the five goals against, they also looked better in their own end in this game, as well. Gap control, crease clearing and controlling the stick of the opposing team have not been a strength of this club under Manny Malholtra so far, but DP25 showed how nice and simple life can be when you keep things simple by shutting down Judd Caulfield from getting to a loose puck in the blue paint:
Pettersson closes the gap, controls the stick of Judd, and then makes sure to turn and box Caulfield out so he can safely retrieve the puck and get it out of harm’s way. A small thing, but a good sign of defensively responsible hockey from Vancouver.
And again, it was nice to see the Canucks push back against the Ducks and not just sit back waiting for a perfect counterattack. Fil Hronek tried the ol’ Hank Sedin “icing but not quite” dump-in-play late in the first period, leading to Paul Cotter skating hard onto the puck and getting Brendan Gallagher oh so close to his first goal in a Canucks jersey:
Nothing fancy about this play either; it was basically dump-and-chase, then find a way to get the puck on net, but sometimes that’s the best play to make.
It also helps that Anaheim’s view of defence is more akin to a snooty waiter at Chez Quis than most NHL teams, but damn it, you take these wins where you can.
Best hand job
With time winding down on the clock, Liam Öhgren scored off what looked to be the NHL’s version of a pick-six, only for the referee to blow the play dead due to hooking:
Now, in the NHL’s defence, this is a play they have been calling a penalty pretty consistently over the last few years. If you get your stick anywhere near a player’s hands, they tend to blow the whistle (unless it’s the third period, overtime, the playoffs, they have money on the line and/or want to use game management because they don’t like a player). That’s why this play sometimes gets called slashing instead of hooking; they really don’t want broken thumbs, I guess. Head shots they can accept, but they draw the line at bruised hands.
I don’t think this was egregious, and I think it was actually a brilliant takeaway from Liam, but yeah, the NHL tends to call this. You have to have razor precision on your stick lift, otherwise refs might blow the whistle. Just pretend EA Sports cranked the stick-lift penalties to 100, and that’s what we’re dealing with out here.
This, of course, sent the Ducks on the power play, where Beckett Sennecke once again just blithely played give-and-go, this time with Cutter Gauthier:
Send the puck down low, then send it back high, and that’s a two-goal swing essentially in the span of a minute. The Ducks made that look far too easy, but once again Kevin Lankinen played a part in that as well. Another shot where you found yourself going, “ok that’s a good shot but like, you could have stopped that one, right? No one is angry Kevin, we just think you could have had it. Look, don’t get angry Kevin, we’re on your side here. Kevin, put down that baseball bat. Kevin. Put the bat down. Kevin what are you doing, KEVIN WHAT ARE YOU-”
Now, this goal got the fans in Rogers Arena quite angry, which is good because it means people still care. It’s every high school relationship argument you’ve ever had come to life once more.
So in a way, it was actually nice to see people livid about a call and chanting their thoughts about the performance of the officials, as it reminded you that maybe, just maybe, better times lie ahead.
Best Kevin put down the bat
Things started going south in the second period when Leo Carlsson scored a shorthanded goal that I would describe as nice, but also, Kevin, couldn’t you have stopped that one?
The Canucks look good once they get set up on the power play, but getting into the zone still gets messy at times, as seen here. After farting around with the puck around the blue line, the Ducks do a quick sexy three-way pass that ends with Leo Carlsson sniping home a goal short-side on Lankinen:
Again, fantastic shot. Leo Carlsson, you are that dude. You know how to score at a high level; that shot could feed families (somehow, I am not sure of the science behind this, please don’t Theranos me.)
But you can see Kevin just swipe downwards with his glove as Leo goes high, and it just feels like Lankinen is guessing on almost every shot at times? Which, again, I get it. Everything is scoring on you; it’s hard to believe in anything at this point. It’s the Looney Tunes routine of Wile E. Coyote getting burned by ACME so many times that he’s scared to put on shoes lest they blow up.
Best Jacob Two-Two
Following his new “A fight every period means I’m fighting for you all the time” protocol, Quillan then had a fight with Travis Mitchell, who seemed irked that Jacob clipped his goalie:
That one I get from a “somebody gotta fight that dude” perspective, because anytime someone takes out your goalie, odds are you need to punch someone for it.
But that tends to come with a cost, and much like Quillan’s earlier fight, it earned the Canucks another power play. Now Vancouver didn’t score on it, but damn it, the momentum of the fight led to their second goal of the night, and I won’t hear otherwise.
Best calling his shot
I am not convinced in the slightest that Drew O’Connor had any idea Linus Karlsson was open in the slot when he hacked at the puck behind the net, but he should 100% take credit for a) hard work and b) a pass that looked amazing either way:
The only thing nicer than the hard work from DOC was that finish from Linus Karlsson, who, if his agent Thomas Drance has anything to do with it, will fetch a pretty penny come trade deadline day. His board work and netfront game, along with that little splash of finish, is the perfect complement for a playoff team looking to add depth should Vancouver want to explore it.
Also, that finish is absolutely sublime. Anytime you can wait a goalie out like that and score on them, your ego grows at least two sizes; it can’t be helped.
Best fistful of dollars
Remember when I said Zeev Buium struggled at times in his own end? Well, here is Drew Helleson dangling right around Zeev, which somehow led to Jamie Oleksiak having to fight Jeff Malott?
Helleson was given a penalty for charging into Lankinen, and then I guess Malott got so angry that he wanted to punch Oleksiak, so they kind of tumbled to the ice, and the Canucks walked out with a power play.
Either way, I believe that is what they call a teachable moment for the young Canucks defender.
Now the Canucks didn’t score on said power play, but at one point Elias Pettersson booted the puck through the air to keep it in at the blue line, right into Brock Boeser doing a 360 no scope before passing to a streaking Brisebois who, had he scored, would have absolutely blown the roof off of Rogers Arena:
The Canucks don’t get a ton of highly skilled-looking goals anymore, so when plays like this happen, it tends to stand out. Though if any team had a guy soccer-kick a puck over two guys into his teammate, spinning off of the boards in full control of the puck, it would probably stand out as well?
Either way, Brisebois failed by not scoring and cementing this as a top-10 play of the year for Vancouver. For shame, Daryl Dixon, for shame.
Best leaky leakerson
Now the Ducks power play is on fire in ways NBA Jam never thought possible, but the point stands; The Canucks were the third-worst penalty-killing team in the league heading into this game, and that was before letting in three goals on the power play:
I have to assume Sennecke is bored at this point, as he picks up his third assist doing literally the same exact play he ran with Cutter Gauthier on his first goal of the night. Puck down low, puck back high, goal.
There is some traffic there, and Cutter has a great one-timer, so again you find yourself feeling for Kevin Lankinen. But baseball bat worry aside, you just keep thinking he needs to make some stops on these shots to give his team a chance.
Unfair? Maybe. But he chose the goalie life. It is a harsh one.
Best not great, Bob
JPats has this ability to find stats that are just really stark, and I love it. The Canucks could be losing, and somehow he finds what I call a sobering stat where I find myself going “Really? Geezus.” more often than not.
Best final frame
The Ducks opened up the scoring in the third period when Cutter Gauthier (assisted by Beckett Sennecke because of course) unleashed a snipe show from high in the slot to beat Lankinen cleaner than breakup poetry:
This was the goal I think Kevin would want back the most, because you can see him make himself small in net and lean the wrong way on the shot, giving Gauthier plenty of space to pick his spot.
The good news is that at least Sennecke’s assist wasn’t a down-low, up-high play, so you know — small victories and all that.
But as you can see on this goal, it just felt like the Canucks would get some momentum and then the Ducks would sort of easily score, and then the Canucks would have to find a way to get back into things again. Which, to their credit, they did on this night. Compete was fully in their nature. But it did feel like this was a game that maybe they win if Leevi is in net.
WHICH IS UNFAIR, I GET IT, BUT I DIDN’T MAKE THE RULES ABOUT THE GOALIE LIFESTYLE.
Go yell at George Merritt.
Best first string quarterback Jake
Before we get to Jake’s goal, we have to discuss the Canucks’ new plan of running the goalie and then getting a power play out of it. It’s bold, but I like it.
This time it was Max Sasson clipping Laurent Brossoit, and at what point do we just say the Ducks’ goalie is clumsy?
The end result was that Max had to fight for The Code by squaring off against Noah Warren, and then randomly Sam Colangelo decided Paul Cotter had to pay for Sasson’s crime? Admittedly, The Code isn’t quite clear on that, but this resulted in Cotter and Colangelo being tossed from the game due to the secondary altercation rule, which, sure, why not, I guess we’re calling that.
Cotter was understandably upset about being tossed from the game for a fight he didn’t start, something the rule book says he can be cleared for, but alas, the important thing is no thumbs were slashed on this play. Please keep the important things at the forefront.
The Canucks walked away with another power play, however, proving once again that running the goalie leads to goals. We have to stop arguing against this and just accept that it’s open season on goaltenders now.
And Anaheim, who thinks defence is a funny way of saying palisade, got a bit thirsty for another shorthanded goal. And you know who made them pay? November Jake:
We’ve talked about it before, but the Canucks having an honest-to-God, veteran, skilled line in Boeser, Pettersson, and DeBrusk has led to some of the better offensive zone shifts from this team, just in terms of creativity and skill level. This goal was no different, as Brock Boeser’s sneaky, underrated defensive board play shuts down Mikael Granlund trying to squeeze by him on the boards, leading to Elias finding Jake skating hard in on the Ducks goalie.
And that finish from Jake? Absolutely disgusting. In the best way possible. Filthy, filthy stuff from November Jake.
Best riding high
The Canucks, at this point, were feeling it, scoring another goal after a fight, against a team they know they can come back against. After riding that sweet, sweet high for a little bit, Jamie Oleksiak found himself all alone at the top of the slot because why bother covering him? THAT’S WHY YOU COVER HIM:
Things to like about this goal:
  • Another skill goal from the Canucks. They moved the puck with aplomb, they found an open guy, and they scored. Lovely little goal.
  • The puck actually went in off of Jake’s elbow, which happens because he’s in the right spot. His blue-crease game has picked up, and he is riding high right now in terms of having a tremendously strong net-presence game. If he isn’t scoring goals off of body parts, he’s helping screen the goalies so his teammates can score.
  • Brock Boeser has never been accused of being a fast skater, but he got on his horse to win the race for the puck on this play. Without Brock’s hustle and effort, there is no goal on this play.
  • Elias Pettersson got his second assist of the night? IS HE BACK? Discuss amongst yourselves.
The Canucks would, of course, fall short of the comeback, but you know what, they went out on their shields.
At the eight-minute mark, once again the Canucks veteran line went to work, winning puck battles and getting shots on net:
Another week of this and that top line will need a temporary nickname. You know it, and I know it. Nothing formal, but we should play around with some ideas. Stockholm Syndrome feels too aggressive, but I also kind of love it? EP40, Brock and Jake have all stated on record that they don’t want to leave the team, so I think this kind of fits perfectly?
Either way, the game ended where it should always end; On the stick of Jamie Oleksiak:
Not much chance of that one going in, but we’ve seen weirder goals in Vancouver.
The last great chance of the game actually went to Prime Time, who tipped a point shot just wide, with Lankinen pulled for the extra attacker:
Did it feel bad that Lekkerimäki didn’t randomly score two goals to tie this game? Of course it did. But at least he was out there making smart plays.
End result? Solid tank game. Team was in it the entire night, and they fought back when they could have easily shut things down after being down 5-2.
Well played, good lads, see you next game.
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