We are now a quarter way through the season, and every Vancouver Canucks fan is thinking the same thing:

This "tanking" stuff is easy!

The Easy Part

The first one percent of this 250+ game rebuild went great! Beating the Oilers on their home turf, losing to them on ours, not a problem! But there are other teams in the league, and it would be nice to beat some of them on occasion, too.

The team has three wins, which is rough, but even worse is those three wins coming against division rivals. Or it would be worse, if those wins had any effect on the standings. Edmonton is in their predicted division lead; Anaheim in third; and Calgary's pressing for a wild card spot. Vancouver is well away from any of those things.

Heck, two of those wins came in overtime, so they were still generous in giving out in-division points. Their one overtime point came after losing a two-goal lead late to Florida. Perhaps the Canucks' recent habit of playing hard with ten minutes left is in response to that pain?

Managing just three wins in twenty games is worse than was planned for. But is it actually that bad?

How it's Gone

A quite reasonable complaint about Vancouver's record is that they have just one win at home. Even in a rebuild, you want to give the paying audience a decent show. That extends the patience a bit longer, and provides some grace to the players and management.

The Canucks are lucky enough to have a ludicrously well-informed fan base. We like to joke that they play in a city of two million general managers, but it's not that far off. Even their casual fans know what the deal is in a rebuild. Even a dozen wins at home would be reason to attend.

Vancouver has scored 25 goals in the third period of their games, which has made them worth tuning in late for. The down side is how much of that is scoring effects - pushing to score because the team has to. Good entertainment, at least, but protecting a lead would be a nice change.

They are not going to end the year below 15 wins, but it's November. What's the season of cold rain for if not gloominess?  We're just going to look at one thing that hasn't worked and, for a bit of brightness, one thing that has.

Special Teams That Aren't

The closest I've heard to home-crowd boos so far this season was during their last game against the Flyers. Now, we know how Rick Tocchet coaches - basic, low-event hockey. But good lord, that was a boring game until the usual kick awake with ten minutes left Vancouver does.

It was during the Michael Bunting power play with about nine minutes left that grumbling began. They started the second unit, but absolutely nothing was happening, matching the rest of the game. A back-and-forth between Brock Boeser and Jonathan Lekkerimäki finally got a result, and the rest of the game was pushing for the tie.

That was Vancouver's 13th power play goal. Their power play is not great - 18th overall - but it isn't quite in the bottom third of the league. It's not the same story on the kill.

There are a handful of games the Canucks have killed off all their penalties, but that's it. They have an awful 63% success rate, which, for those keeping score at home, means if they take three penalties in a game, they're probably down a goal.

One of the common maxims in hockey is that your goaltender needs to be your best penalty killer. Given that the Canucks' best goaltender was a waiver find, that's not good news. Kevin Lankinen needs to take his share of the blame for the team's record, but it's not all on him. It's a hazard to have three young defencemen dressed every game, and boy has that shown!

Wonder Wire

Speaking of the waiver wire - a bit on that later - how good a find has Leevi Meriläinen been? The Ottawa Senators castoff has now played in 14 of Vancouver's 20 games. He's allowed as many goals as Lankinen has in his nine.

The supposed backup is now in the net as the Canucks starter for the foreseeable future. That makes things difficult for Lankinen, who isn't getting moved anywhere. Teams aren't lining up to trade for a career 2A/1B who is swimming out there, not for three more seasons at a $4.5 million cap hit.

On the plus side, Lankinen does have an actual track record. He's not only better than these numbers, but even if he returns to his 2025-26 form, that will do as a backup. There is little chance he regains the starter's job between now and season's end.

It's not like Meriläinen's been miraculous. His career numbers are close to Lankinen's, but with a smaller sample size. That is all the difference between Lankinen's collapse and his recovery: having two Meriläinens available.

The (Present) Future!

The Abbotsford Canucks just had their eight-game win streak come to an end, and there is some movement happening there. The dirt-cheap Ilya Safonov tried his luck in North America and it didn't work out for him. Not a bad dice roll for a team paper-thin at centre, but those don't normally work out.

The junior squad is getting Victor Mancini back, with Vancouver hitting the waiver wire again. This time, it's defenceman Cameron Crotty from, well, not Minnesota. The Wild picked him up for a second tour while dealing with an injured blue line, but he didn't play a game for them.

Crotty did play for the Wild farm club with Liam Öhgren and Marco Rossi, so there's some familiarity. And I do think it's a good sign when a team brings a player back for a second tour with the farm club. That shows a layer of trust, even if his skills aren't the best.

Crotty's a 27-year-old, mostly-AHL veteran, mostly known for reliability in his own end. He has good size (6'3", 210lbs) and durability. He is pretty much what you want in a seventh/Quad-A defenceman. In the Canucks' case, he could well take the sixth spot from either Luke Schenn or Guillaume Brisebois.

The Future Future!

What would it take to get Kevin Korchinski out of Chicago? If they're desperate to improve NOW and all that? His numbers aren't great now, but they were, and his new coach doesn't trust him enough to play him.