Analyzing the Canucks’ power play and how it can improve
By Lucas Celle
A stronger sense of urgency & faster pace
It’s a simple concept, but it makes sense. When you have an extra man on the ice, your main focus is to capitalize on that opportunity, so it’s crucial for teams to enter the zone quickly and set up the umbrella as efficiently as possible to allow for more time in the offensive zone.
Yet, at times the power play units handle the puck lazily, with nonchalant zone entries that result in turnovers and cleared pucks back to the other end of the ice.
There were numerous times on Sunday vs. the Wild (and the Florida road trip, for that matter) where the Vancouver was sloppy with their puck handling around the blue line and didn’t make the most of their two minutes, because they had to continuously regroup and retrieve pucks that were dumped back into their zone.
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Additionally, once they access the zone, the power play unit sometimes operates without any urgency, as if they just woke up after a late night and were forced out of bed to attend a 6 a.m. special teams practice the following morning.
This causes the clock to wind down while they continuously pass it around the outside of the umbrella. It’s easy for teams to defend that, especially when the Canucks don’t tend to disguise their obvious intentions of setting up Pettersson for his patented one-timer at the top of the right circle, or as some fans like to label it, the “Petterzone”.
More urgency and rapid, strong passes across the zone could cause penalty killers to become flustered and lose track of their assignments, thus creating open lanes and more space to shoot. Speaking of shooting…
Shots, shots, shots!
Of course, it’s easy for us to say when we watch a Canucks game, but at the same time, the puck won’t go in unless it’s put towards the goal. Many fans can admit that they’ve yelled “shoot the puck!” at their televisions more than once before, and that’s because this top power play unit seems reluctant to take shots at times. It gives me flashbacks to the infamous Sedin power plays and their excruciatingly painful patience with the puck.
Whether it’s for the fear of those shots getting blocked and causing a turnover, or because the players are simply just hesitant, it looks as though they’re consistently trying to make an extra pass or two to set up for a predictable one-timer or find the best angle possible.
Where problems occur, however, is when there are no great angles available. Then what? Pettersson, Boeser and Hughes are all talented shooters, so as they sit at the top of the umbrella it’s important for them to attempt to get shots through at a high velocity and low angle if their options are limited, so someone like Horvat can bang home the rebound and chalk up a greasy one on the scoreboard.
That’s how they managed to score an unbelievable five power play goals in one game against the Predators back on Nov. 21. When Hughes decided to go back to the basics and fling a shot at the net against Minnesota on Sunday, it resulted in the Canucks’ first goal of the game after five failed power plays. Every hockey player has been taught that good things happen when you put it on net.