Canucks: 3 Takeaways from the Canucks 5-3 loss to the Seattle Kraken

A season in the AHL could do wonders for Arturs Silovs and Danila Klimovich. 

The young Latvian goalie, Arturs Silovs will go down in the history books, starting the first-ever Canucks – Kraken (preseason) game, in which he showed flashes of brilliance and flashes of the jitters.

He started the game very well, finding his rhythm in the first period and shutting out the Kraken team with some saves that kept fans on their feet.

Unfortunately for the team’s ill discipline, Silovs was put to a real test which saw some of his nerves shine through, as the Kraken had plenty of powerplay opportunities.

On several shots, it was noticeable that Silovs was nervous and was doing a little too much in terms of his positioning and his movement as often he would make the first move in anticipation where a veteran goalie wouldn’t bite first.

It is quite possible that his growth was stunted last season as he spent the year in the minor leagues in Latvia, playing for HS Riga and HK Mogo.

The quality of hockey there is not the highest and that showed today as his transition to the North American game was not bad, but also not the greatest despite him winning over a lot of fans after his performance.

Yes, he was left exposed too many times on the penalty-kill, which doesn’t help but his positioning needs a little work and hopefully, a season in the AHL with the Abbotsford Canucks and goalie coach Curtis Sanford will address that.

Silovs was replaced by Spencer Martin in the third period and left the game with three goals against and a decent display overall.

As for the young Belarussian forward, Danila Klimovich, the big bright lights of the Spokane Arena seemed to get to him.

He was noticeable during the game but very little as he did not get a lot of opportunities to showcase his ability.

He is a skillful winger that likes to play in space and in the loss against the Kraken he, unfortunately, did not have a lot of that, so he was kept silent during the game.

The biggest reason for that is the fact that the Canucks could not stop conceding penalties, meaning Klimovich saw less and less ice time, only having one opportunity on the powerplay.

If we would have had a chance to see his skill set more on the powerplay, it is a good assumption that he would be a big part of that unit.

Klimovich made a little appearance in the post-game shootout as he stepped up and unfortunately missed the 1-on-1 against Chris Driedger.

After this game, you can’t be so sure that he is destined to make the final roster but keeping him close in Abbotsford would be great either way.

The team’s defence won’t improve if they keep playing shorthanded. 

With the team carrying all of the momentum into the second period after an assertive first, the Canucks poor discipline really hung the team up to dry.

Penalties from Rathbone, Juolevi, Madison Bowey, the debutant Jason Dickinson and youngster Danila Klimovich never allowed the Canucks to take control of the game as they did at the start.

The Kraken come away from this game with three powerplay goals from powerplay units that only practiced special teams the morning before the game!

Talk about giving the game away!

Watching the Canucks in the second and third periods was frustrating because they could not help themselves in any way, and despite a goal in the second period from Nils Höglander to level the game, the Kraken kept the momentum and carried it forward adding two more goals to their tally.

With a little rant out the way, we must keep in mind this was the first game this preseason, along with that the Canucks played a young line-up for the most part against a Kraken team that had all of their big names in the team.

With that being said, we all know that the Canucks defence is the weak point of this team, so, discipline has to be one of the priorities for the squad, otherwise, an already struggling defence just gets thrown under the bus and the team spends most of the game chasing instead of controlling.

One can be sure that Travis Green will address the discipline issues in tomorrow’s game against the Calgary Flames because a Canucks team is a dangerous team at full strength or on the powerplay, it’s just about eliminating silly cross-checking and tripping penalties.

Other Notes

• Will Lockwood looked solid, didn’t offer much but for a fourth-line forward, he did well forechecking.
•  Brad Hunt seemed to fit in well and his experience would add a lot to the squad.

Let us know your thoughts on the game in the comment section below!