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The Stanchies: Canucks laser focused on dead last in 6-1 loss to Stars
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Photo credit: © Bob Frid-Imagn Images
The Stanchion
Mar 3, 2026, 02:45 ESTUpdated: Mar 3, 2026, 03:11 EST
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The Vancouver Canucks lost to the Dallas Stars 6-1, and you know what?
I have no whimsy to share. No stories to dive into. No metaphors loosely based on the odd sexual tension on Life With Derek.
We are all pretty much locked into the results of the trade deadline this week, so it’s hard to get lost in all the magic of whatever this game was.
The good news? The Canucks continue to maintain a death grip on last place, while I assume the league sweats bullets about Vancouver, maybe, possibly, finally landing a first overall draft pick.
And while I imagine the league is considering using a spinning wheel “just for the spectacle of it all” and to pay proper respects to Canucks history, this current trajectory is the best course for the team to take.
The only problem is I think the veterans are all kind of waiting to get off the island, so to speak. I don’t want to say the team looks checked out, but if they turned around and started scoring on their own net “to help things along”, I wouldn’t even blink.
It just feels like people are in a bit of a stasis, with a head coach most likely pondering the ramifications of this season on his NHL career, with veteran players visibly eyeing the emergency exits, and young players probably confused why Adam Foote keeps telling them to feed the puck to Sakic or Forsberg and let Patrick Roy take care of the rest.
The good news is that by Friday, we should have some answers, but the bad news is that, given the way the team is playing, it’s hard to imagine how much value many of these players even have at this point.
Don’t get me wrong, a good GM can still make trades in this environment, but Patrik Allvin didn’t exactly impress with last year’s deadline performance.
Still, the end game is still the same: the Canucks need to move as many veterans as possible and recoup as many draft picks as they can. Anything under three trades will honestly be seen as a failure, as it should be.
But until then, we get to watch games like the one on Monday night, in which a vastly superior team with a far higher trajectory in life stomps all over you, recreating memories you thought you’d repressed from high school.
It was a truly awful game from Vancouver, but at this point, you are legally bound to read this entire article. I don’t make the rules, I just enforce them.
Let’s do this.
Best dare to dream
I just. Man.
I am so tired.
To be clear, I don’t think media scrums are some magical sacred event that must be viewed with proper respect. I understand the banal nature of them.
But it is part of the NHL ecosystem where players get asked dumb, dumb questions and hand out dumb, dumb answers, while we writers try to mine through them to come up with something resembling interesting content. It’s a fun little game we all play.
And when you get paid millions of dollars to play hockey for a living, I do think the bare minimum of answering questions without looking like you’re dead inside isn’t a big ask. Just a spot of customer service would be a delight. You don’t have to love your job, but I still rented videos to people with a smile (I’ll explain what a VHS tape is later, and a Blockbuster Video, and a Video Update for the hyper-local reference).
It’s just, the culture around this team has felt like dog sh!t for a long time now. Everything feels so heavy with this team. It feels like you could ask them if they enjoyed the weather, and they would throw their hands up in the air with a heavy sigh before rolling their eyes and telling you they haven’t checked the weather yet, so they can’t comment on it.
And on one hand, I understand it isn’t a fun place to be in right now. The results on the ice are atrocious to the point where you truly wonder if the division-leading Wash Ur Apples of Burnaby ASHL could rack up a win against the Canucks. That maybe Brandon Del Grosso could outpace Elias Pettersson in points.
It’s also the only team in the league that suffers a loss like tonight and then has to hope they can get a good locker at practice the next day, before the 10-and-under open skate group arrives.
So I understand that off-ice and on-ice, things aren’t great. We all get that.
But it’s all the more reason why they absolutely need to gut this team. You want fans to invest; you need players who look invested, and right now, I don’t know who is more excited for a roster turnover, the fans or the players themselves.
All I am saying is it’s been a couple of years now of this sour-puss approach to life from the Canucks, and if they want to sell tickets, the entire culture around the team has to change, and change fast.
No more funeral speeches when you get asked if you need to play better, that’s all I ask.
Best of the good times
Nikita Tolopilo got the start for the Canucks, and I generally enjoy watching him in net over any other Canuck goalie, if only for the aesthetics of it all. He just plays like someone who enjoys making a save once in a while compared to some of the more robotic nature of most NHL goalies. He has a bit of flair to his game.
And make no mistake about it, the end result of this game wasn’t his fault at all. Despite his .838 save percentage on the night, he continued to make saves and not once did he motion to his bench and demand a trade, which has to count for something.
So let’s honour the young netminder with this clip of him making a save when the game was still 0-0 and everything felt so possible in life:
Godspeed the rest of the way, Nikita.
Godspeed.
Best shooters shoot
Evander Kane opened up the scoring for the home team when he basically skated in the general direction of a Jake DeBrusk rebound:
This goal was notable because it was the last positive sentiment you will see about Marcus Pettersson on the night. He made a really good outlet pass to Jake DeBrusk to get this rush started, so make sure to really take your time and savour it properly.
Also, I like how every time Evander Kane scores, we’re all joking about his trade value going up, but we’re also not really joking? You can clearly see the desperation behind the tweets? It’s like we’re trying to sell a car and praying our folksy charm will secure a deal.
“She may not look like much, but she’ll get you where you need to go. Can’t say the same about my ex-wife, though, am I right? Ha ha ha ha. Ha. Please buy the car. Please. I don’t even have an ex-wife, I don’t know why I said that.”
Best waiting for the beast to awaken
Vancouver is in that territory where other teams circle them on the schedule and mentally note it’s going to be an easy night. You look at this roster, and there is absolutely nobody to be afraid of or gameplan for. At least with Quinn Hughes, you know the other team was going to be annoyed chasing him around the ice all night, and there was a possibility he might carry the Canucks to a win.
Now? The Canucks best forward is Drew O’Connor, and their best line is anchored by Teddy Blueger. I can’t imagine there is much scheming to be done to try to shut them down. Which means teams kind of take it easy for a period, going full big brother on the Canucks, before they sit up in their chair and take things seriously.
But until then, the Canucks got to believe they might actually make it 2-0 on the power play, or at the very least, Elias Pettersson might get an actual shot on net:
I do agree that the puck movement was nice, but Elias Pettersson once again finds himself taking too long to get a shot off to the point that you start wondering if the one timer Petterzone ever even existed.
And coming off of his third period benching the game before, I think Adam Foote hoped it would light a fire under EP40’s ass, but it felt like more of the same: solid defensive effort, but a complete lack of impact on the offensive side of things:
No dekes. No dangles. Just getting bullied and shoved to the ground with disdain. Even with leading the forwards in ice time on the night with just under 19 minutes, Elias Pettersson could not manage a single shot on net.
It is truly incredible what EP40 has turned into compared to his earlier seasons.
Best fun word play
At one point, the Dallas Stars thought they had tied the game up, but they forgot one thing: Tolopilo doesn’t do foot stuff:
You can’t beat him in the feet. You just can’t. The puck goes near his skates, he locks it down like a young Ty Pardy, that’s just how it goes.
Good luck ever trying to score near his feet, Dallas.
Best well sh!t
OK, well, mistakes happen:
Yes, that is Adam Erne, with the assist from Bert, making use of a fortuitous bounce off the boards. Erne basically punched the puck around Marco Rossi, and PO Joseph could do nothing but watch as the cruel God of deflections careened the puck towards the net and in off the skate of Nikita.
Now, many teams could bounce back from said bad luck. Luck is a big part of any sport, so you need to learn how to roll with the punches.
Alas, Vancouver is not such a team. When Dallas scored, you kind of felt normal again, to be honest. It felt a bit weird when Vancouver was winning; nothing made sense.
To use Love Island dialogue, it felt awkward being in a love triangle, and you didn’t enjoy Dallas asking you if you’d be ok with them being open for a chat with the lead because you already know they made out with the lead in Soul Ties before Movie Night.
Best simply better
Jason Robertson didn’t just beat Elias Pettersson; he also nutmegged Evander Kane, so you know, at least everyone is failing together:
An important takeaway in that clip is Jake DeBrusk standing in the middle of the ice doing absolutely nothing. This comes into play in a moment.
But first, Wyatt Johnston would almost score when his shot off the rush almost squeaked by Tolopilo and into the net:
All of which is to say the second period had arrived, and you just sort of knew Dallas was taking over for the rest of the night.
This was punctuated by Lian Bischel scoring while Jake DeBrusk did a remix edition of his earlier defensive zone play by standing in a circle and covering absolutely nobody:
Jake is straight-up quitting on the Canucks to the point that I think he should have his Pokémon card-buying privileges revoked. I just don’t think you can be a neutral observer in hockey; that feels a bit unfair.
You think Wash Ur Apples gets to lead their division without Brandon Wong paying attention in his own zone?? I think not.
Best sleep was a good choice
Apparently, the Dallas Stars have a good power play, and the Canucks penalty kill is the very opposite of that?
I am starting to seriously consider the fact that Derek Forbort is the key to everything with this team. I have fought it for far too long; I think I just have to accept it at this point.
Regardless, Dallas would make it 2-1 off of a wicked one-timer from Jason Robertson on a second period power play:
Vancouver didn’t even do much wrong here, to be honest. Dallas didn’t even give them enough time to start chasing the puck and falling all over the place. Instead, Matt Duchene just skated in and found Robertson for the quick shot. It was an act of mercy, really.
In a perfect world, yes, Conor Garland closes the gap at the point and gets his stick in the shooting lane.
But you also have to give credit to the opposition for being good at their jobs sometimes.
Best of the comeback
The Canucks best scoring chance in the middle frame? Nils Lundkvist whiffing on a clearing attempt that Linus Karlsson jumped all over, leading to a one-timer from Nils Höglander:
Hey, if you’re only going to have one scoring chance in a period, it might as well be a piss missile attempt. I have yet to find somebody not thrilled by watching a cannon of a shot beat a goalie.
Which just sort of underlines the problem with the Canucks right now. To borrow a term from Rick Tocchet, they just have no juice. Every shift is a survival event. There is no structure. There is no plan. It’s just hoping to survive the shift so someone else can get scored on.
Zone exits with possession? Don’t exist.
Zone entries? Same thing.
The entire makeup of this team is a combination of shots from the point into traffic, hasty line changes, and frog DNA.
Best what he said
As I said, clean zone exits fled the scene when Quinn Hughes quit on Vancouver and ran to Minnesota:
Elias Pettersson just sort of tosses the puck back towards the net instead of taking the easy play along his own boards, and the end result is a scoring chance for Dallas.
Ilya Lyubushkin would then get a shot after Fil Hronek failed to clear the puck from his zone as well:
It’s bad hockey from a bad team. A good team like Dallas is going to feast on nights like this.
Best speaking of turnovers
Marcus Pettersson’s descent into madness/Luca Sbisa continues, as his soft clearing attempt ended up hitting Miro Heiskanen in the skate, leading to MP3 panicking at what was unfolding before him and doing what Tyler Myers always taught him: dive at the first sign of trouble.
So Marcus dives at the puck, and Sam Steel, sensing the nervous energy in the air, waits out the Canucks defenceman and spins to find a wide-open Matt Duchene for the goal while Brock Boeser politely watches from a distance:
Again, this is very much a solid combo of “ok Dallas is really good at what they do” and “But Vancouver is also really bad at what they do.”
Best did Elias Pettersson get a shot on net yet?
No.
I also have no idea why there are five seconds of total darkness at the end of the video clip, but it feels apt? It feels like a good metaphor at work?
Best correct target assessment
With the game well in hand, Dallas kept scoring because hey, why not?
Colin Blackwell was next to light the lamp, as Marco Rossi backed off from Blackwell at the same time as Zeev Buium stepping up and away from Blackwell, giving us the kind of disastrous combination normally reserved for Love is Blind:
Again, that’s a tremendous finish from Blackwell, so credit where credit is due. But Vancouver is also making it incredibly easy for teams to get these chances night in and night out.
Best but why not both
Down by many goals, God bless Tom Willander for trying to get his team back into the game with an end-to-end rush. Alas, Garland didn’t drop back to cover the point, so when Willander was stripped of the puck, Matt Duchene found Sam Steel with a perfect pass that Tolopilo had to make an amazing save on:
It’s almost over, I promise.
Best how about another?
After seeing how much fun it is to jump into the rush and give up an odd-man rush, the defensively postured Elias Pettersson walked into a pass from Conor Garland that felt like it was better suited for a right-handed shot. The end result? Another breakaway:
Tolopilo was not the problem in this game.
Best sweet merciful end
And why not complete a night of terrifyingly bad plays from d-men with Marucs Pettersson giving up the middle of the ice to Mavrik Bourque, which led to Linus Karlsson sliding over to double team because why not, leaving Bischel all alone to snipe home the sixth goal of the game:
Man-on-man coverage is really fun until it isn’t.
It’s basically the same goal we’ve seen all season long. The Canucks break down in their coverage, they double-team in a panic to try and get at the puck, and they can’t recover in time to stop the team from finding an open skater.
Best standing on business
No more excuses is what it comes down to. Just find a way to get deals done.
Best stark reality
It wouldn’t be the NHL if we didn’t see the Canucks buck the odds and find a way to escape landing a top draft pick.
Best jersey Botch
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