𝓤𝓷𝓲𝓽𝓮𝓭 𝓝𝓮𝔀𝓼

The Vancouver Canucks fell 4-2 to old friend John Tortorella in his debut as the head coach of the Vegas Golden Knights on Monday night.

Here are 10 observations from the game, with notes on Evander Kane’s 1000th game, Tom Willander’s offensive output, Elias Pettersson chasing NHL blocks history and more:

1. Pettersson’s Victor Wembanyama act

Pettersson blocked a shot high in the defensive zone Monday night on a play that nearly sprung a two-on-one, his 100th shot block of the season.

The Canucks centre is now 14 shot blocks away from breaking the single-season NHL record for a forward, currently held by Alex Tuch with 113. At just over a shot-and-a-half blocked per game, Pettersson is on pace to surpass Tuch.

You get and deserve a lot of credit for standing in front of pucks launched by NHL shooters. And a shot blocked is generally a better outcome than a shot saved.

In basketball — where a shift in possession is guaranteed after every scoring event — San Antonio Spurs big man Victor Wembanyama’s record-breaking blocks pace is a massive and positive difference maker for his team. In hockey, it’s a bit different. Blocking shots at high volume — or, in Pettersson’s case, record-breaking volume — is a poor process indicator. More than anything it means that your team doesn’t generally have the puck when you’re on the ice.

Pettersson’s overall defensive impact was greater last season in Vancouver’s tighter defensive environment than it has been this season. Credit to him for sacrificing his body to prevent shots on goal, but the blocks record shouldn’t be viewed as a proxy for defensive excellence.

2. Willander’s lack of offense

On two sequences in the third period against the Golden Knights, you could see where Willander will have room to improve as an offensive decision maker.

The first occurred with Vancouver trailing in the third period. A Vegas defender skated lumberingly to the back of the Canucks’ net and attempted a clearing pass that was picked off. Vancouver worked the puck down low with decently dangerous intent, and it circled back to Willander at the point. With Vegas scrambling and about eight minutes left, Willander uncorked a 35 foot wrist shot that had the effect of playing catch with Vegas goalie Adin Hill.

Later, Drew O’Connor tested Hill with a dangerous deflection, Brock Boeser took a hit and Willander jumped down the half wall to take possession of the puck. Instead of looking to maintain possession by finding a teammate up high, Willander attempted a bad angle shot, which wasn’t even recorded as a shot attempt. Hill froze the puck and Vegas took another breather on its way to closing out a 4-2 victory.

Since the Olympic break, Vancouver is only generating shots on goal at a rate of 18 per 60 minutes with Willander on the ice. It’s the lowest among all Canucks defenders by a fair margin.

The 21-year-old Willander’s surface level production as a first-year player will be solid at season’s end, regardless of how many points he produces. There’s more to having offensive impact as a defenseman, however, then simply being credited with points.

3. Zeev Buium’s confidence

This is an impossible environment for Canucks players to be evaluated on their defensive play, and Buium has certainly had a few moments where the seams have shown.

What’s been great to see over the past few weeks, though, is how frequently Buium is both challenging checkers one-on-one, and having success maneuvering about the ice in search of setting up scoring chances.

We’ve seen more of these sequences from Buium on the breakout across the past month or so, but his game in Vegas on Monday night was the best he’s looked at probing the opposition’s defensive structure in the zone.

Buium led all skaters with 1:54 of puck possession on his stick tonight.

Zeev has been more aggressive and confident with the puck down the stretch. The odd mistakes happen as he tests his limits in the league but the next step is turning this into more production

— Satiar Shah (@SatiarShah) March 31, 2026

4. Marco Rossi’s two-way play

After running hot and producing in bunches for a few weeks, Rossi has gone a bit quiet in terms of production over the past five games.

That said, he’s been quietly holding his own as a two-way player in tough matchups. On Monday, Rossi went head-to-head against Mitch Marner or Jack Eichel for over 12-and-a-half minutes of five-on-five ice time. In those minutes, Vancouver actually managed to outshoot the Golden Knights six-to-five.

Canucks coach Adam Foote had challenged Rossi to be better defensively, and he largely has been. Now he just needs to play more minutes on a consistent basis, especially games Vancouver is trailing throughout the third period.

5. Kane scores in his 1000th game

Kane finished off a two-on-one with Jake DeBrusk to open the scoring in his 1000th career game. That many NHL games played is an incredible milestone, especially for a forward who spent a lot of his career playing physical hockey and throwing hits at an extraordinarily high volume. He also hit the mark despite missing a full season in his mid-30s following a significant run of surgeries.

With the way this season has gone for the Canucks, it’s definitely not ideal for the team to celebrate Kane’s 1000th game on the other side of this road trip. I’d imagine the club is putting a good deal of thought, for example, into who should represent it in that ceremony, to limit any open display of fan displeasure.

Any awkwardness, however, is circumstantial. It shouldn’t take away from Kane’s accomplishment and milestone.

6. The game-winner

It was a really tough defensive sequence from the Canucks on a Vegas goal late in the second period, which stood up as the game winner.

The Canucks got pinned, unable to change, after a clear into the neutral zone that the Golden Knights were able to quickly send back into the zone.

On the hard rimmed dump-in, the Canucks were all out of sorts. Marcus Pettersson went to the half wall on the right side to win the retrieval, which was necessitated by Willander’s aggressive leaning to support the breakout moments earlier. Teddy Blueger, meanwhile, took a winger’s assignment and rushed across the ice to cover Brayden McNabb after Pettersson couldn’t get to the puck.

Kane, meanwhile, missed the read to become the centre. With Pettersson on the wall on the right point, and Willander at the net front, Kane didn’t take over for Blueger in the defensive alignment.

The result was a Reilly Smith one-timer that Canucks goalie Kevin Lankinen had no chance of stopping.

7. Another power-play goal

The Canucks did score on the power play. A Boeser deflection off of a Filip Hronek point shot briefly restored a one-goal lead in the second period.

In a season when just about nothing has worked for Vancouver, their power play at the very least has been a genuine bright spot. Since the Olympic break, in fact, Vancouver is manufacturing power-play goals at the fourth highest rate among any NHL team.

Installing Hronek on the first power-play unit, and allowing Rossi to quarterback things from his downhill side has made the biggest difference.

8. The new-look Pettersson line

The underlying performance wasn’t impressive — the line was outshot two-to-one — but it felt like the Pettersson line, with Linus Karlsson and Liam Öhgren flanking him, were decently threatening on Monday night.

That new-look line felt reasonably fresh and creative, and created a few decent looks, including a nice Öhgren rush in the third period.

Öhgren and Karlsson are both tied for the team lead in five-on-five scoring since the Olympic break, warranting this sort of opportunity down the stretch. Hopefully they can help get Pettersson going a bit before the conclusion of the regular season.

9. Patrick Allvin’s scouting trip

I’m told by various birdies in rinks around North America that Patrik Allvin and other members of Canucks hockey operations traveled to see North Dakota, Penn State and the London Knights in an assortment of playoff games last weekend.

While speculation about Allvin’s future is understandably about to hit a fever pitch, Vancouver’s top executive is certainly putting in the miles and the viewings to prepare to pick at the top of the draft.

10. Another tough spot for Nikita Tolopilo on the horizon

Vancouver played in the Pacific Time zone on Monday, will play the Avalanche on Mountain Time on Wednesday, then head to the Central Time Zone for its reunion matchup with Quinn Hughes and the Minnesota Wild.

That’s three games in four days in three time zones, with a lot of travel mixed in, hard enough for a very good team, much less the NHL’s last-place team by a country mile.

With a back-to-back looming against a pair of genuine offensive juggernauts later this week, Nikita Tolopilo will surely need to start one of the games. That’s a really tough spot for a young goaltender who can’t exactly be feeling very confident after he was put on ice for two weeks then pulled against the Calgary Flames when he got another chance.

The Canucks have handled their goalie situation poorly. Now Lankinen has appeared in seven straight games, and surely can’t be asked to go back-to-back. Meanwhile the club is now at risk of putting a young goaltender who had been a bright spot for much of the season in another impossible spot against a quality opponent playing behind a tired team that gives up too many scoring chances even when rested.

It’s really hard to mess up any worse than this.