VANCOUVER, British Columbia — Connor Bedard’s stoop deepened to a brand new degree Saturday.
In his much-anticipated homecoming sport, the teenage Blackhawks star’s most — and actually solely — memorable play was a whiffed dump-in try on the pink line that led to a game-sealing empty-net aim seconds later.
The Canucks added one other meaningless empty-netter shortly after to seal a 4-1 win, marking their ninth consecutive victory over the Hawks and their twelfth within the two groups’ final 13 conferences courting again to 2020.
Bedard may solely drop and shake his head after the whiff, his confidence having seemingly hit its lowest level in his NHL profession up to now within the very enviornment where he grew up dreaming of enjoying.
“That’s just a bit little bit of salt within the wound…however I noticed the fellows patting him on the again,” coach Luke Richardson mentioned. “He’s possibly holding onto the puck just a little too lengthy and searching for one thing higher. We attempt to encourage him to shoot the puck. He’s an elusive shooter. If we will get him skating and taking pictures the puck on the fly, I feel that’s when he’s probably the most harmful.”
The Hawks’ offense is as dry because the Canadian prairies proper now; they’ve scored only one regulation aim in 5 consecutive video games. It was Ilya Mikheyev, celebrating his personal less-notable Vancouver homecoming after getting traded from the Canucks to the Hawks final summer time, who scored that lone aim Saturday off a Nick Foligno rebound.
That marker gave the Hawks a 1-0 lead after a well-played first interval, however their sport disintegrated following the intermission. The Canucks tied the sport on an Elias Pettersson aim throughout a second interval by which they outshot the Hawks 14-7, then claimed the lead for good on an Erik Brannstrom aim with 15:35 to play.
Bedard was credited with simply two shot makes an attempt, one on aim, in 16:48 of ice time. His aim drought prolonged to 9 consecutive video games and his level drought to a few consecutive video games.
The Canucks largely matched up Pettersson towards him, and through Pettersson and Bedard’s ice time collectively, the Canucks generated a whopping 16-1 benefit in shot makes an attempt (and 7-0 edge in photographs on aim).
Bedard’s defensive acumen has improved considerably, that means he hasn’t been practically as a lot of an total legal responsibility; he has solely been outscored 10-9 throughout five-on-five play thus far this season, in comparison with 67-37 final season. Nonetheless, the Hawks haven’t any probability of producing sufficient offense to outlive when he’s this chilly.
“I feel our high quality scoring possibilities had been up tonight,” Richardson mentioned. “Sadly, [we] simply can’t discover the again of the web. [There’s a] lack of drawing penalties, too.”
In Seth Jones’ injury absence, Connor Murphy led the staff with 25:04 of ice time, adopted intently by Alex Vlasic — who had an unusually inconsistent night time — at 23:33.
“It’s getting irritating,” Vlasic mentioned. “It’s fairly tiring to depend on one aim to win towards a very good staff.”
