Not many goals! Only 1 goal scorer! Not enough!

1st road game lost. Nice to get that out of the way. Welcome back!

Not a great game by the forwards on the Nucks road hockey team. Demmers was all world... and beyond. Without him this would have been an 8-1 loss. So, that's good. Sort of.

On the bright side, finally... Quinn holds the record for the most points by a Nucks defender.

That was the high point of the game. Other than Demko stopping nearly everything...

As per Natural Stat Trick, #Canucks Thatcher Demko stopped 12 of the 13 high-danger shots he faced tonight.
-- ‪Adam Kierszenblat‬ on Bluesky

Tied 0-0 after 1, thanks to Demmers.

In the 2nd, Nucks get scored on. Twice. And don't score back. The 2nd Oil goal was particularly aggravating for us.

Fuuuuuck bad bad turnover by Chytil.

-- Twitch (with mid-season seasonings)

Chytil's horrible giveaway costs the game, though lots of things to improve on the PP and need some offense. Want to see Mancini's speed in the lineup soon. Quinn isn't being as dominant as usual yet and the new Petey needs to start playing.

-- ‪DJTaxman77‬ ‪ on Bluesky

With the Oil outshooting Nucks 14-4 in the 1st and 14-5 in the 2nd, Nucks offense can only get better. Right?

Right. In the 3rd, the not quite comeback begins as Quinn gets an assist on Brock's special spin -to-score shot. Game thread, already in mid-season form pulling the silver out of the linings...

Good news is Hughes is now tied with Talbot for points.

--Twitch

But despite getting a 6-on-4 EN Nucking PP chance... Oil get the EN goal to win 3-1.

So canucks... on a 6 on 4, stick explodes, whole team decides to hit the showers early, game over.
-- Twitch

Yeah, look how lazy Hughes was there. Obviously, they all quit.
-- Thursday

Hughes is never part of that... but everyone else looked like their first time under pressure, giveaway, giveaway, shit pass, giveaway, ENG.

-- Twitch

Game/Player Highlights

Demko was the #1 star of the game, kept the Nucks in the game when the Nucks forwards were busy being scrambly in the 1st half of the game. And the middle part of the game. And the last part of the game.

Special teams... well Nucks PK didn't allow a single goal on 10 minutes of defending against the McOil. So that's good. The Nucks PP? Well... only got 4 minutes of extra wrong man time, so not enough time or shooters. When will we see Lekky on the 1st unit and on the EN more man gambit?

Meanwhile... our #1 center isn't winning draws at a #1 rate.

Whoever has been teaching faceoffs to Raty (Manny?) really needs to work with Petey. Raty 9 and 2. Petey 3 and 12. Wonder how they are against each other in practice? Your 1st line centre cannot have the worst pctg. on the entire team.

‪DJTaxman77‬ on Bluesky

It's game 2 and despite the small sample size, we can already draw conclusive hopes, pretty much.

I truly hope we don't have another season where we get limited shots most games because we have what looks like limited urgency. I want to believe, dammit.

-- Twitch

GAME HIGHLIGHTS

So many 5 alarm saves on HNIC!

GAME STATS

COMMENTING OUT LOUD

Bessie gets a goal and a presser!

Huggie thrilled with the record breaking game - and frustrated with the team effort?

Footey doesn't win his 2nd NHL game as a coach. And not punching reporters. Yet.

Too soon to say 'Here we are again'... but here we are again... low effort, not enough jump, too many penalties, slow start and not enough shots and goals. The usual.

Next game back at home hosting the Blues on Monday where we can welcome back Suter... and discover how much we miss him.