TORONTO — On one of his finest shifts this season, Elias Pettersson barely got out of his own zone.
It was in the third period Saturday night with the Vancouver Canucks, against all expectations, leading the Toronto Maple Leafs 3-0. On one of his many shifts against the Leafs’ top line, Pettersson sprawled to smother a scoring chance from Matthew Knies, peeled back into the slot to block Phillippe Myers’ point shot, and then followed the puck behind the net and won a battle against Mitch Marner.
And on his next shift, Pettersson anticipated a backdoor feed to Knies and got his stick in the passing lane to take away a likely goal.
“He was amazing,” Canucks captain Quinn Hughes said. “A couple guys on the bench were yelling ‘Selke!’ after one of the shifts in the third.”
One of those guys was winger Kiefer Sherwood.
“I said it to Petey, ‘That’s a Selke kind of game,’” Sherwood said. “That one shift in the third, he’s blocking shots and defending… stuff that doesn’t show up on the stat sheet. But that leads to winning hockey.”
Asked if he heard his teammates’ calls for the Selke Trophy, handed to the league’s top defensive forward, to be awarded on Jan. 11, Pettersson said: “Well, it’s the first time I’ve heard it this year.”
It’s possible Pettersson’s remark was accidental self-deprecation. But hopefully, he meant to poke fun at himself because it would demonstrate, also, his awareness that what the National Hockey League’s fifth-highest paid player has offered the Canucks this season has not been good enough.
Pettersson had perhaps his best game on Saturday, and all he finished with on the scoresheet was one assist and five shot blocks in 16:08 of playing time. But from start to finish, Pettersson was fully engaged, intense and competitive.
It’s what teams need from their leaders. And it epitomized the Canucks on a night when you’d have stuffed your retirement fund had you wagered on a 3-0 road win for Vancouver.
After not nearly enough drive in Friday’s 2-0 loss to the Carolina Hurricanes, when the Canucks registered just 15 shots on target and their top players lost their matchups, a freak snowstorm shut down Raleigh-Durham airport and grounded the team’s post-game charter. Vancouver players did not arrive at their Toronto hotel until about 1 p.m. on Saturday.
The Leafs, 17-7 at home this season and just off a five-game winning streak, did not play Friday and were waiting for the Canucks.
But it was Vancouver which drove play early on, getting a deflection goal from Brock Boeser 31 seconds into the contest and outshooting Toronto 9-4 in the first 10 minutes.
Hughes scored for the Canucks on a point shot late in the second period, and Sherwood made it 3-0 just 47 seconds into the third with one of his lightning-strike releases from the slot after a pretty setup from Hughes, who was dominant.
The Canucks held the Leafs to 20 shots, and Vancouver goalie Kevin Lankinen needed to make only a few big saves for the shutout.
“It’s funny what the mind can do when you have to dig in a little deeper,” Sherwood said. “We committed to defence. I think our defending has been really good the last little bit. We just haven’t produced as much (offensively) as we would have liked.
“We needed this. We kind of needed a statement win to get our mojo back and kind of turn our season around. There’s a lot of noise out there, but if we can just continue to do our business, focus on our process and our identity, we’re a good team in here. We know that, and things will turn over time.”
This was Game 42 for the Canucks, the start of their second half after a tumultuous first half marked by injuries, absences and melodrama.
Saturday’s game showed what the Canucks still possess after all those swells and crashing waves.
“It was a whirlwind 24 hours here,” veteran defenceman Tyler Myers said. “Guys stepped up tonight. It was a huge win for the group, coming on a back-to-back with a crazy travel day. It seemed like a lot of guys were going tonight and playing the right way. We played real simple, and I think it provided more opportunities for us. I think we have to realize that going forward, and try and bring that more consistently.”
Asked about Pettersson, Myers said: “He battled. It was very noticeable. He was very engaged, and it’s great to see. When he plays like that… that’s why he’s one of the top players.”
“He was dialed,” Boeser added. “That’s the Petey we know, blocking shots and making plays and looking confident out there. When he’s playing confident, he’s one helluva player.”
The Canucks’ performance came after coach Rick Tocchet said in his pre-game media availability that the team needed more from its top forwards: Pettersson, Boeser and J.T. Miller.
“I mean, they know it,” Tocchet said after the game. “They know that for us to be successful. . . they’re going to have to score some goals for us. But also, like, I think they’re happy because we played a smart game. We got timely goals. But I think they all played good defence, too.”
Pettersson skated with Jake DeBrusk and Boeser, who was redeployed from Miller’s line. Nils Hoglander returned to the lineup and skated with Miller and Conor Garland, while rookie Jonathan Lekkerimaki was dropped to the fourth line and looked comfortable playing with Teddy Blueger and Phil Di Giuseppe.
Guillaume Brisebois also got back into the lineup on defence, replacing Vincent Desharnais.
The overall effect was a feeling of freshness among the Canucks, who played with far more energy on the second night than they did the first of their difficult back-to-back.
As Tocchet described, “guys had a little juice.”
“Listen, the last couple years, it’s a resilient group,” the coach said. “It takes a lot of punches, and it gets back up. So this is one of those times we got back up.”
Now, they need to stay on their feet.
With four points from four games on the road, the Canucks’ formidable five-game trip ends Tuesday against the Winnipeg Jets.
