Golden Knights 4, Canucks 1: One last letdown in a sorry season gone astray

Yahoo

17-04-2025

It was fitting that Wednesday's 2024-25 season closer for the Vancouver Canucks was a joyless, dour affair.
In a season where very little went right, where most of the hockey was tepid and uninspiring, of course the final game of the year would be exactly that.
The Canucks lost 4-1 to the team that unseated them as division champions, the Vegas Golden Knights.
Vegas are headed to the playoffs. They also dressed a minimal lineup. They started their third-string goalie. They had ex-Canuck and No. 8 defenceman Ben Hutton playing his 11th game of the season and his second game in two nights.
And they still won in a cruise.
All three of their goals came from turning the juice on at just the right moment: Victor Olofsson picking the top corner on a rush late in the second on Kevin Lankinen, Pavel Dorofeyev sniping a similar goal but on a pretty cold Nikita Tolopilo — in for Lankinen after a muscle strain — and then Jack Eichel beautifully tipping in a point shot moments after taking a hard hit from Kiefer Sherwood.
The Knights are built to win. The Canucks thought they were going to be a team like that.
Turns out they're still a long way off.
'A team like Vegas that's what you strive for,' head coach Rick Tocchet said post-game. 'They wear you down.'
That said, even if the results weren't there, Tocchet said he saw a lot of good things from the young players they'd gotten a look at the last couple weeks.
'The first thing you look for is effort. Right away. I think that's the easiest one to pinpoint,' Tocchet said. 'And then there's digesting a game plan and can they execute? Or can they retain the information and apply the next game? Things like that you look for.'
Another telling fact about this game: the Canucks had just 14 shots on goal with two minutes to play.
We get this game means nothing. But there are still fans in the building paying a lot of money to be there. They get the players to praise the fans for their support — surely they could show show sweat on the ice and find more shots.
The remarkable thing in this was there were 13 shots between the two teams in the first 8:39 of the game. It was loose off the top. You thought it was going to be at least an entertaining evening.
It didn't deliver.
'The microcosm is when we have the goalie pulled. We got three guys not moving in the middle of the ice,' Tocchet said. 'Sometimes that happens. And we got to go through that barrier.'
Missing the playoffs was tough to swallow for Kiefer Sherwood, whose motor kept running to the end. He kept throwing hits, kept making smart plays. He was exactly what the Canucks wanted him to be: an impactful bottom-six winger. Of course, he made an impact in the playoffs last year for Nashville against the Canucks and figured switching jerseys would take him back to the playoffs. But it didn't.
'Definitely humbling,' he reflected about missing the playoffs this spring. 'You don't realize how hard it is until you're in it, and you're thrown a lot of adversity. You only get so many cracks at it as a player.'
'That was something special be part of on the other side,' he said of last spring's playoff series between the Predators and Canucks. 'Like I came across the video today of that 2011 series, and just got chills watching it, because here's so much love for the game that everyone breathes here, and you just want to give them something to keep cheering for.'
Cole Schwindt nailed the empty netter. It's his first career NHL goal. This was his 49th career game.
He's played for Florida and Calgary as well – and was an extra piece in both the Noah Hanifin and Jonathan Huberdeau trades.
Kevin Lankinen was replaced in the third period, to some surprise.
He was dealing with a muscle strain. 'He pinched something. He just felt uncomfortable. Didn't want to risk anything,' Tocchet explained.
During the second period, the Canucks put up a promo about winning a trip to Oregon.
The crowd loudly booed. We all know why.
For all the things that went wrong this year, one thing the Canucks nailed night in and night out was recognizing a child who has faced health battles as their Canucks for Kids Fund Star of the Game.
It's how sports should be.
Uplifting. Supportive. Inspiring.
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