A good way to celebrate any milestone.
The Vancouver Canucks took care of the Philadelphia Flyers last night by a 3-0 scoreline, capping off Tyler Myers’ 1000th NHL contest in style. It was a solid win, one that showed off a lot of the defensive habits that this team wants to build, while also showing that there were still plenty of things to be ironed out. It’s hard to be overly critical of a shutout win though, as most parts of this team were clicking and playing up to their abilities.
Here’s the win, by the numbers.
Game Flow
Vancouver got off to a good start territorially in this one. Racking up 68.97 CF% in the first period, the Canucks were able to translate that into a 61.76 xGF% share. However, after the first, Vancouver sat back. The second period saw the teams split a 50.00 CF% share, but the Flyers were the ones that got a 60.23 xGF% in the middle frame. Philly would follow that up with 63.16 CF% and 74.43 xGF% in the third, racking up a 3-0 lead in high-danger chances to try and close the gap, but the Flyers would remain off of the scoreboard. While the share metrics were not the best for Vancouver, the one solace that they could take was that the raw volume of scoring chances, Corsi, and expected goals were all kept pretty low in general. In total, neither team broke 2.00 xGF for the game at 5v5.
Heat Map
That low-event nature translates into this heat map. In total, the Flyers had a 32-19 lead in scoring chances across all situations, but that only yielded a 10-6 edge in high-danger chances. At 5v5, these gaps shrank to 25-18 and 7-6 respectively. While the Canucks weren’t able to get a ton of chances themselves, the ones that they got they were able to make count while keeping the Flyers limited in what they could create. It was only thanks to the power play that Philadelphia even managed to get anything going in terms of raw numbers, and realistically it didn’t seem to push the needle much at all.
Individual Advanced Stats
Corsi Champ: This one was a surprise. In his return to the lineup, Daniel Sprong led the Canucks in CF%, totaling an impressive 80.00 CF% share while slotting in on the fourth line. There would always be growing pains when it came to his defensive work, but it seemed to be a good thing to have Sprong sit out and watch from above to see what is expected of him on this team. A noticeable difference was seen in his efforts in his own end, and that’s all you could really want out of him thus far into the season.
Corsi Chump: With how the Canucks were decently outpossessed in this game, someone would have to bear the brunt of it. Unfortunately, through the first couple of games of the season, Carson Soucy has been a little un-Soucy-like, bringing up the rear of the Corsi department with a 38.71 CF%. While he is one of the Canucks’ better options when it comes to defensive defencemen and thus will see some tougher deployment, the numbers aren’t looking the best. Soucy also finished with the worst xGF% on the team (25.66) while being on ice for a 2-10 disparity in scoring chances.
xGF: Would you look at that. Sprong also finds himself as the team’s leader in xGF%, totaling a 65.62 on the night. Granted, much of it was against lesser competition and with limited ice time, only racking up a team-low 0.15 xGA, but that’s definitely an improvement considering where he was at prior to the healthy scratches. Sprong didn’t face a single HDCA during his TOI either, so there are definitely some promising signs in a small sample size. Quinn Hughes once more generated the most xGF on the team with a 0.80, showing just how limited the opportunities were in Philadelphia.
GSAx: The first Finnish goaltender to ever post a shutout in Vancouver Canuck history. Kevin Lankinen looks to have cemented his place as the starter until Thatcher Demko returns, putting in a sparkling performance against the Flyers. With Philadelphia posting a total of 3.01 xGF, Lankinen blanking them meant that he went home with a 3.01 GSAx, a full three goals saved to help Vancouver take home the victory. Again, he wasn’t the busiest netminder in the world, but it’s no easy feat to post a shutout in the NHL. Vancouver did a good job of playing team defence to help get him this result.
Statistical Musings
The forward lineup?: It could be worth a longer look at the line combinations that were iced last night. Starting with the fourth line of Suter-Åman-Sprong, the trio ended up posting the best CF% amongst forward lines last night while also giving up the least xGA, keeping their noses clean in about 6:03 of 5v5 ice time. Sherwood-Blueger-Heinen ate up a big chunk of time, equalling the DeBrusk-Boeser-Miller unit in ice time while producing similar results in CF% and xGF%, both of which are pretty darn nice to see.
Sherwood and DeBrusk especially were providing plenty of physicality, recording 9 and 7 hits respectively. Having both lines get on the board offensively while producing similar advanced stats is really nice to have, essentially having a 2a and 2b line. The line that saw the most ice time was that of Höglander-Pettersson-Garland, the trio managing to generate the most scoring chances of any line last night. Again, it is just one game, but it would be interesting to see if Tocchet sticks to a lineup that got success up and down the lines.
Where the Brännström-Desharnais pairing clicked: It did take a game and it is just one game, but what a difference it makes to have Erik Brännström in the lineup. With Vincent Desharnais, the duo had the best xGF% of any Canuck defence pairing, Desharnais finishing as the second-best on the entire team with a 62.34 and Brännström fourth with his 54.38. They were instrumental in helping keep the game low-event during their TOI, which wasn’t an insignificant amount either. The pair only saw 1 scoring chance given up while 5 chances were created during their time together, without facing a single high-danger chance against. Brännström’s style of play seems to complement that of Desharnais a lot better than Forbort, and while it remains to be seen if he can keep this play up – at least Vancouver has a decent third pairing to throw out there.
As a team
CF% – 48.25% HDCF% – 37.50% xGF% – 34.56%
It was a good game for the Canucks, but it was far from a perfect one. On the shares, they were letting the Flyers have quite the advantage on them. Vancouver played a good game to keep the raw opportunities limited and generally lower the danger of chances against, but they’ll want to prevent the lapses that gave up a couple of odd-man rushes for Philadelphia. Still, it’s hard to be mad about a 3-0 win, with some nice performances from the depth pieces as well as a shutout from Lankinen.
Vancouver has a bit of a break before they take on Connor Bedard and the Blackhawks in Chicago on Tuesday.
Stats provided by naturalstattrick.com
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