Capitals 2, Canucks 1: The goals are on the inside, Rick Tocchet says

The Vancouver Canucks were good early on and scored first, but that was undone by terrible defensive play in the second period.

And that was that.

There are 14 games to go in the season. That’s actually good news: There’s plenty of time for the Canucks to get out of this little funk they suddenly find themselves back in.

A week ago, things seemed back on course. The Canucks had won four games in a row, dismissing three pretty solid teams along the way.

They were playing tight, defensively sound hockey, and they were grinding their way in crunch time.

But in this ugly loss to a low-quality team, on the back of a disappointing finish to a game they were well in control of on Wednesday — against one of the true Stanley Cup contenders no less — you are right to wonder how things will look when playoff crunch time comes just over a month from now.

He later used his hands to show how high the Canucks should be shooting.

“This high,” he said, holding one hand about a foot above the other, then raising the upper hand dramatically, making his point clear.

“Not over the net. It makes no sense.”

How bad was the Canucks’ shot selection? This bad: They had 21 missed shots on the game.

And then it gets worse: They had 27 shot attempts blocked.

Yes, the Canucks had 48 shot attempts go nowhere near the net.

The Capitals did everything they could to keep the Canucks off balance and it worked.

It’s sloppy. Deal with it.

Some games are just going to be ugly. Some times its about how the opposition is playing. Sometimes it’s because you’re playing on ice made by a 30-year-old ice plant.

“That’s what we’re trying to get better at is, you know, when it’s not going good for us, how are you gonna play? We played with a lot of leads this year. We have been trailing going into the third very often and that’s just something we need to be better at, it’s when we you know, we’re getting pushed by the other team, how are we going to respond,” J.T. Miller observed.

The veteran forward wasn’t especially happy with his game. He struggled at times with handling the puck and with some of his puck decisions.

“When teams push at us, we just kind of stop executing and it snowballs.”

Quinn Hughes pointed a finger at himself.

“I feel like I’m going pretty good in the first and then you don’t see me in a second,” he admitted.

More energy

The poor shot selection wasn’t the only thing that frustrated Tocchet.

“Execute. Go through. Hold the puck.”

And, yes, the team lacked energy. More energy would fix many of these issues.

“Energy is ‘going through,’” he said.

Tocchet does believe in his team. They’ve had success for so much of this season. The pressure is just harder now. Teams are checking tighter. This was a low-event game and you just have to find a way to make a few more moments happen for your team.

The coach made an analogy to finding the seal on a container.

“That’s my job, to get them to break that seal. There’s more in the tank. You know, there’s always more and we’ve got to break through it. Find it,” he said.

Pass and move

Hockey, like soccer, is a depth-width-speed game. You find space by moving forwards and laterally and usually with speed.

Doing that opens up lanes for yourself and sometimes for your teammate.

“Guy passes the puck and we just kind of cruise instead of passing (then) snapping yourself on a direct line to wherever it’s gonna be, to the open area. Or even if you go to the net, they’re gonna check you, (and) somebody else might be open. So we’re just kind of cruising. I’m not sure why,” he said.

Superstars, man

They find a way. They just do.

Alex Ovechkin scored the winning goal but was otherwise invisible.

But that didn’t matter. He was excellent when opportunity called.

“The guy’s amazing, you know, even at this age, he finds some how to contribute. I’ve seen a lot of those, seen that guy score a lot of goals live,” Tocchet said.

Worst second period of the season

The Canucks started the game well, scoring in the first minute, but they slowly lost their way over the first period.

And then the second happened.

The Canucks looked stuck in mud almost from the start and had no defensive structure on either of Washington’s goals: first an awful breakdown leading to Tom Wilson’s goal, then another on Ovechkin’s go-ahead goal.

They just looked lost all period and were outshot 14-5 over the 20 minutes.

Brutal stuff.

How brutal? Watch this clearing attempt by Filip Hronek and the disaster that ensues.

Fight for more

Tocchet believes in his squad. There’s will, passion and talent. He’s said this more than once.

He once again laid out the path to success that he believes his players can find.

“It’s in that room and it’s you got to stick together. I mean, I’m sure guys are upset, maybe mad at their game or mad at whatever, but they got to come, whether I bring them in or I’m not sure but they gotta come in and ask, ‘How do I get better?’ You know, ‘What am I doing wrong?’ You know, ‘Am I going to the net or am I maybe not executing?’

“Maybe you gotta go early a little bit and start to handle the puck more, shoot more pucks? Are you shooting 50, 60, 100 bucks a day, if you’re missing the net,” he said.

“That’s the sort of the mentality to have at this time of year. So we’ve had a lot of practice time, so that’s why I don’t buy the energy (being low). I just don’t buy it. We should have lots of energy.”

NEXT GAME

Tuesday

Buffalo Sabres vs. Vancouver Canucks

7 p.m., Rogers Arena, TV: SN Pacific, Radio: Sportsnet 650

Just one power play

The Canucks power play only had one opportunity. They didn’t score, but they did have some good movement.

They could have used a few more opportunities, but they didn’t do much to draw any other penalties.

Tocchet pointed back to his team’s struggles to get to the inside of the slot.

“Well, interior right? That’s where you get penalties, right? When you go through, here’s hooking.  Or your front of the net guy (they) might cross-check, yeah? You know, (interior) that’s where you get the penalties.”

Here’s the tip

First it was Bo Horvat. Then it was Andrei Kuzmenko.

This season, it’s Boeser and Nils Höglander.

Höglander has seven tipped goals.

Stripes, what are you doing?

The Canucks needed to defend better on Tom Wilson’s tying goal, but the icing call before that was terrible.

Phil Di Giuseppe was clearly going to be first to the puck, but linesman Ryan Gibbons made the call anyway.

Di Giuseppe was unimpressed but didn’t say anything as he skated back to the Canucks zone.

Gibbons, for whatever reason, pursued the Canuck forward down the ice and talked his ear off, presumably explaining the call.

Why NHL officials have a need to explain away their decisions boggles the mind.

Tocchet said Gibbons apologized to the bench for the call at the start of the third, but he surely he knew right away he’d missed the call. He could have apologized then and move the faceoff to centre ice. Officials are allowed to do that.