Wednesday February 28 - New York Rangers 6 - Vancouver Canucks 5 (OT)

Well, that was a barnburner!

Brock Boeser scored twice, Daniel Sedin tallied his 20th of the year and the Vancouver Canucks came back from a 3-0 deficit to earn a point and force overtime before falling 6-5 to the New York Rangers on Wednesday night at Rogers Arena.

Here are your (many) highlights:



After playing well on the recent road trip, I thought Jacob Markstrom looked like he was ready to go as he bounced up and down during the final notes of the national anthem.

Wrong. Kevin Hayes tucked a wraparound past him at the 1:22 mark of the first period—once again, the opposition's first shot of the game. Forty-three seconds later, Vladislav Namestnikov earned his first point as a Blueshirt with a second assist as Jimmy Vesey scored on the Rangers' second shot. Markstrom settled down a bit after that, making two saves before being pulled at the 12:29 mark of the first, when Hayes scored his second of the night.

Yep: three goals on five shots. Ouch.

With just over a month to play in the season, NHL.com lists 47 goalies in their "goaltending leaders" category, with at least 22 games played.

Out of that group, Markstrom's .909 save percentage ranks him 31st. Anders Nilsson is 42nd at .902. The five goalies below him, in order: Craig Anderson and Mike Condon of Ottawa, Chad Johnson of Buffalo, Thomas Greiss of the Islanders and Scott Darling in Carolina.

Meanwhile—wow—Ryan Miller ranks seventh with an 8-5-6 record in 23 appearances with a .925 save percentage.

Continuing down this painful path—Roberto Luongo has only played 20 games so he's not quite on the 'leaders' list but his save percentage this season is .927.

Will Thatcher Demko get a look before the end of the year? And can the Canucks stay patient as they wait for him to get his feet under him at the NHL level, or will they need to shore up their netminding this summer?

.@KevinisInGoal: That's the mindset, that by the time all these players are ready to have an impact and compete for something other than the top draft pick, Thatcher Demko will be your guy. The question is if Jacob Markstrom can get to the point where he's a good partner for that

— TSN Radio Vancouver (@TSN1040) March 1, 2018

Anyway. Goaltending issues were quickly pushed to the back burner on Wednesday when Brock Boeser kicked off the Canucks' comeback with his 28th of the year, less than two minutes after Markstrom was pulled.

2️⃣8️⃣th goal for Boeser, who is tied with McDavid, MacKinnon & Matthews at 12th in @NHL scoring. 🚨🙌 pic.twitter.com/t6bGOmoUrM

— Vancouver Canucks (@Canucks) March 1, 2018

He'd add another beauty to tie the game with less than a minute to play in the third.

Brock Boeser's shot was back in form tonight. Look how quickly he transfers the puck from his backhand to his forehand before zipping it past Lundqvist. That's flat out unstoppable. #Canucks pic.twitter.com/IRIBzWyH5g

— Grady Sas (@GradySas) March 1, 2018

That's Boeser's first multi-goal game since January 23 and just the second game where he has scored since hurting his wrist in Tampa Bay on February 8.

Henrik Lundqvist faced a whopping 55 shots on Wednesday, but Boeser's attempts stood out to him.

Asked Henrik Lundqvist about Brock Boeser: "It's not only his shot, but how he finds the spot to shoot from. It's one thing to have the shot, but he finds the openings. Yeah, he's a great player, there's no question about it. Hard to stop" #Canucks #NYR

— Randip Janda (@RandipJanda) March 1, 2018

The Rangers got some nice contributions up front from their new acquisitions Namestnikov and Ryan Spooner but with a defense that now consists of Marc Staal, Brady Skjei and four other dudes, the King is going to be facing a ton of rubber for the rest of the year.

As for the Canucks' new guys? Early impressions are promising.

Brendan Leipsic picked up two primary assists in his first game in Vancouver colours and led the team with seven shots on goal. He saw a little power-play time and was paired with Boeser in overtime, where he generated two shots but didn't get back in time to prevent John Gilmour's OT winner.

This is a train wreck defensively but I couldn’t care less. Young, aggressive, wild....also very fun to watch. Can always work on systems, that can come later. I’ve liked Leipsic tonight—quick, slick but doesn’t look out of control

— Ray Ferraro (@rayferrarotsn) March 1, 2018

Tyler Motte played 12:52, finishing with three shot attempts and two hits. He nearly earned a standing ovation from a pumped-up crowd at Rogers Arena for his tenacious forecheck during a third-period penalty kill.

Wow this is amazing. #Canucks fans showing love after Motte dominates the PK. Sutter with a good chance. 👀

— Danny Castle (@DannyDCastle) March 1, 2018

Even if the Canucks don't pick up many points over the last month of the season, fans will be thrilled if they get to watch more games like that down the home stretch.

A couple of other prospect notes to finish off today:

First—after lighting it up for the Kelowna Rockets this year, Kole Lind is now officially signed:

#Canucks ink Kole Lind to three-year entry level contract; @klind13 has 85 points in 51 games with the @Kelowna_Rockets this season. https://t.co/j1B2gaz2pm

— Vancouver Canucks (@Canucks) March 1, 2018

And over in Sweden, Elias Pettersson gets closer and closer to making history.

Reader Slightly Offside did a great job of summarizing where Pettersson currently stands in Swedish U20 history, so I'm going to cut and past the DM he sent me on Tuesday:

With the 2 points scored (Tuesday), he is at 48 points through 39 games, and in second spot all time. With 6 games left (I believe) he has a legit shot at surpassing Nilsson's record of 53. His 1.23 P/GP is second only to Kent Nilsson already, though Nilsson is uncatchable at 1.472.

He just passed...
* Peter Forsberg
* Henrik Sedin
* Daniel Sedin
* Nicklas Backstrom
* Markus Naslund
* Thomas Gradin
...all of whom when on to pretty impressive NHL careers.

No guarantee that he will have the same NHL impact (his size is obviously a concern for many), but certainly encouraging.

Pettersson's Vaxjo Lakers are currenly on the ice against Orebro. It's 1-1 at the end of the second period—and Pettersson has the goal!

Elias Pettersson loads up the shot and just snipes it.

He hit the part where the bar and post meet perfectly.#Canucks pic.twitter.com/ZnneeqTAm4

— Ryan Biech (@ryanbiech) March 1, 2018

UPDATE: Pettersson gets the primary assist on Vaxjo's go-ahead goal in the third period!

It looks like there are four games left in the SHL regular season after today, and while QuantHockey lists Nilsson with 53 points, both HockeyDB and Elite Prospects show him with 54.

From @eliteprospects: Elias Pettersson passed both Markus Näslund and Nicklas Bäckström today. With 41 points in 33 games he's among the best junior players in the history of the SHL.#canucks pic.twitter.com/zKNTqPoWMv

— Uffe Bodin (@UffeBodin) January 30, 2018

Pettersson's now at 50 points in aaallllllmost 40 games. Kent Nilsson's 54 (I think) points came in 36 games with Djurgardens more than 40 years ago, in 1975-76. Different era, for sure, but Nilsson posted back-to-back 107-point seasons with the Winnipeg Jets in the WHA when he first came over to North America starting in 1977, then went on to collect 686 points in 553 NHL games.

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