Canucks: 3 takeaways from frustrating 6-4 loss to Washington

Don’t look now, but it might already be is definitely time to enter panic mode for the Vancouver Canucks.

The team continued their five-game season-opening road trip on Monday night, facing off against Alex Ovechkin and the Washington Capitals at Capital One Arena.

Despite only having two regular season games under their belt, Monday’s match-up already felt like a do-or-die moment for the Canucks, who entered the contest with an 0-2-0 record, including a rather disappointing 3-2 defeat in Philadelphia on Saturday afternoon.

As a result, it appeared that head coach Bruce Boudreau felt the need to adjust his line combinations ahead on Monday night, hoping that the change would spark his club.

The most noticeable changes took place on the wing, with Boudreau moving Conor Garland and Vasily Podkolzin up to the top line with J.T. Miller, while Bo Horvat found himself with some more familiar linemates in Brock Boeser and Tanner Pearson on the third line.

Boudreau also did some tinkering with the fourth line, bumping up Curtis Lazar to replace Nils Höglander on the second line.

The team was also still missing half of their blueline, with Tyler Myers, Travis Dermott and Tucker Poolman all sidelined with injury. Poolman participated in the optional morning skate, but was eventually ruled out of the contest, making way for Noah Juulsen to make his season debut.

It was an interesting contest for the away team, who showed signs of strong, high IQ hockey.

But, in the end, the Canucks ended up facing the same fate as their previous two games, making the journey for their first regular season victory even more elusive.

Here are three takeaways from Monday’s 6-4 loss to Washington:

Another day, another blown multi-goal lead

The heading says it all.

Despite what the final score read, the Canucks actually looked fairly decent for the first 40 minutes of the game, particularly in the middle frame when they rattled off three straight tallies to establish a two-goal lead.

However, as we’ve already grown so accustomed to this year, the Canucks managed to find a way to play down to their opponents, and Monday’s contest might have been the ugliest outing of them all.

The team allowed Washington to climb back into the game early in the final frame, thanks to a Dylan Strome powerplay tally to cut the lead to one.

From there, it was all Washington, who were able to easily dictate the gameplay in both the neutral and offensive zones while limiting Vancouver to just a small handful of scoring chances. Vancouver also allowed Washington to drive the net far too easily, as evident on the Strome and Ovechkin goals.

The consistent pressure and control from the home team, not to mention the repeated defensive break downs led to three more unanswered goals for Washington, who helped Vancouver achieve a feat that no other NHL club had previously established.

With the loss, Vancouver has now also allowed seven third period goals this season, to go along with their zero goals for, proving that no lead is safe for this team.