3 takeaways from the Canucks’ 5-4 shootout loss to the Canadiens

After coming away with a thrilling 3-2 win on Friday, the Vancouver Canucks dropped their final game of their road trip by losing 5-4 to Montreal in a shootout.

If I’m being honest, the Canucks were lucky to even earn a point last night, as they were badly outshot and outplayed for most of the game. Even with the loss, Vancouver had a pretty successful road, earning seven out of a possible eight points in the process.

Here are three takeaways from last night’s 5-4 loss to the Canadiens.

Holtby was solid

Braden Holtby made his first start in 18 days last night, and he played a solid but unspectacular game.

The scoreboard might look ugly, but it undersells his actual performance. Most goals he conceded were due to screens, some of which were caused by his own teammates. For example, look at the number of bodies in front of Holtby on Tomas Tatar’s goal, which tied the game at two.

It didn’t get much better in the third, as Alex Edler stood right in front of Holtby on Brendan Gallagher’s goal.

Now, this shouldn’t entirely excuse Holtby, who gave up 0.41 more goals than expected according to Evolving-Hockey. But it does show that the Canucks need to give him better support, especially since he went over two weeks without playing. It’s also worth noting that Vancouver was outshot 40-18 on the night, which isn’t ideal, to say the least.

Overall, I’m pretty satisfied with Holtby’s performance, and if the Canucks can clean up some of their defensive miscues, then there shouldn’t be any reason not to play him more moving forward.

Even strength woes

Last night might’ve been one of the worst games that Vancouver has played at five on five all season, which is saying a lot considering their horrendous start to the year.

According to Natural Stat Trick, Jake Virtanen led all Canucks skaters in expected goals percentage at five on five, finishing the night at 39.22%.

Yes, you read that right. the highest expected goals percentage on the team was still less than 40%, and it was owned by Virtanen of all people.

Given that Montreal had more than two times the number of shots in the game, it makes sense that no Canuck skater came away with decent underlying numbers, but this type of performance is unacceptable.

With that said, Vancouver did play pretty well on Friday so last night seems more of a blip rather than a concerning trend, but it’s still something that we should monitor going into Monday’s match against Winnipeg.