In the end, at least they avoided giving us full-blown PTSD, to the point where Canucks fans could make peace with what was this season, rather than what might have been. Still, for the first 55 minutes of last night’s elimination-game loss to the Edmonton Oilers, Vancouver looked, traumatizingly, like a team determined to recreate the past, starting with 2011.At the risk of ripping open wounds that are only beginning to heal, the Canucks of that year finished a glorious playoff run with a game seven that remains, arguably, the blackest day in franchise history. After blowing 2-0 and 3-2 series leads against the Boston Bruins, a talent-stacked Canucks needed only one last balls-out effort to take home the Stanley Cup. There was also chance there to end almost a half-century of screaming failure as a franchise. The team never even showed up, losing 4-0 in a game they were never in.
(Nine years later, less painfully, Vancouver would also lose a second-round 2020 game 7 to Las Vegas by a score of 3-0, but that didn’t hurt as much, mostly because it was the Covid bubble year, and it was hard to get excited about games played in empty arenas to zero fans.)
So it’s 2011 that still hurts. Much the way that game seven yesterday was (mostly) so painful to watch.
For 55 minutes it was a script we’ve seen before. And it was gutting.
Missing top scorer Brock Boeser thanks to a freak blood-clot, Vancouver was steamrolled right from puck drop, the shots 18-2 at the midway mark of the first period. In the 45 minutes that followed, fans saw a team that looked like it had no answers—the lone bright spot being a holy-shit performance for the ages by rookie goalie Arturs Silovs.
