Real talk, just between friends, but afternoon games for the Vancouver Canucks always tend to be terrible. Whatever the reason is, the early start time, the disruption of their normal routine, and having to eat eggs instead of sloppy steaks, Vancouver always seems to end up looking flat in these games.

Maybe rolling into the arena in sweatpants and pajamas doesn’t prepare you as mentally as it does when you’re rocking your Gucci suit while holding a Tupperware of an assortment of fruit.

And for two periods, it felt like much of the same in Buffalo, with the Canucks generating very little in the way of offence, seemingly biding their time until they could figure the next way to dump in the puck from centre.

Then the third period rolled around, and what started off as a tepid room-temperature cup of tea ended up being a piping hot cup of coffee, and it doesn’t matter if that metaphor is kind of weird because the overtime highlights alone will make you forget anything I write leading up to it. I could talk about how pizza is nothing more than tortilla that failed college and you won’t push back on it by the time you’re finished reading this.

I am that confident in my assessment because Quinn Hughes and Conor Garland were absolutely dazzling in extra time. Sure, we’ll get to the blown 3-1 lead, and yes, we will have a long-spirited debate about net front Tyler Myers, but eventually you’re going to be able to sit back and watch two tenured hockey professors give you a PHD-level class on elite, high level puck protection, leading to the eventual game-winner in the Canucks 4-3 overtime victory.

In short, not since Game 8 have I enjoyed an afternoon game as much as I did on Friday. And much like the bardown goal from 2012, I think this game gave us a goal that is going to cement some of its own lore in Canucks history.

So yes, it ended up being a pretty solid game to watch, even if the spectre of the 9 am Detroit game on Sunday looms over all of us, daring us to try and enjoy another early start.

Lightning can strike twice, right?

But that’s days away, let’s get to the gifs instead.

Best Spoiler Alert

We know the #Stanchies are going to be lit tonight with @TheStanchion's fave going off like that, especially that crafty ministicks OT winner. 🤯#canucks pic.twitter.com/0etB6y7qa2

— Dragon Was Slayed (@522IntoOvertime) November 29, 2024

Michael’s is going to have a lot of confusion soon when people start swarming into their stores in December demanding to see Garland.

Best LaLu battle

It’s Lanki vs Luukko #Canucks

— HockeyFirst (@HockeyFirst1) November 29, 2024

The first two periods of this game? Not so great? I had time to figure out what that extra head on my steam cleaner was for? (It was a wall crevice brush)

The Sabres probably deserved to win this game, as they carried the play for large chunks of the game. It wasn’t an elite level of domination from the Sabres, they just managed to move the puck better and get some good looks on net, whereas Vancouver just seemed kind of content to sit back and see what happened.

MoneyPuck’s “Deserve to Win O’Meter” clocked it in at a 66.6% advantage for the Sabres, so if across the multiverse this game was played in 1000 of them, Buffalo walks away the winner 2 out of 3 times, and who am I to argue with someone who knows the right time to drop an apostrophe like that.

Tage Thompson led the way in shots for Buffalo with six of them, but was unable to get even a single point on the night, thanks in large part to some dude named Kevin:

I feel like having to explain to the family why you didn’t score on the night was because Kevin was mean to you is a tough journey to undertake, yet here we find ourselves.

And make no mistake about it, shutting down Tage Thompson is no easy feat. The guy is unicorn in hockey, he has the size to wrestle Andre the Giant but also the quick hands to fight Steve Blackman. He has that rare ability of being a large dude who can stickhandle through your entire team, giving him two options in how to murder you, physically or psychologically.

It’s why 2003 Todd Bertuzzi remains one of my favourite seasons ever from a hockey player, just due to how rare it is to have a player like that.

But even with all that, Kevin said no. Just straight up told Tage he wasn’t going to have a good time tonight, and based on what I missed in the Pittsburgh game, I feel like stopping shots is a welcome commodity in this town? I don’t want to speak out of turn, but I am starting to suspect that making a save helps towards winning a hockey game?

Best small stakes debate

I love Max Sasson. #Canucks

— symphorik (@symphorik) November 29, 2024

Players often roll through town in the bottom six, and before you know it, they turn into a “remember them?” type player. The NHL is the top league in the world, so even making a handful of games in the show is something to be extremely proud of, but it also speaks to how hard it is to carve out even a 250-game career.

And sometimes it’s easy to see a guy make the team and start wondering what his ceiling is, and to kind of just subconsciously assume that surely they will figure everything out and become an NHL journeyman at the very least.

The cold hard facts of the league, however, is today’s Arshdeep Bains and Max Sasson can very quickly become yesterday’s Guillame Desbiens or Aaron Volpatti.

That isn’t to say Max or Arshdeep’s careers are destined to be nothing more than a couple of partial seasons in the NHL, but it’s just to paint the picture that, yeah, a lot of these guys are only going to be here for a cup of coffee.

The good news is that scoring at the AHL level is at least a strong point in your favour of maybe having NHL success, but you still need to show more if you want to pass the Darren Haydar quadruple AAAA player status test.

Which brings us to the debate portion of this section, in which if you had to pick who has a longer career, Arshdeep or Max, it’s a tough call.

In Bains’ favour, he has an NHL shot and has found a way to improve his game at every level he’s played at.

In Sasson’s favour, he has NHL speed and a smart hockey IQ.

I haven’t seen a ton from Bains yet that has made me perk up and want to see more. We’ve mostly seen him be a systems guy for Tocchet, putting in the lunch pail effort and making sure he isn’t making any Kuzmenko-level mistakes in coverage.

And while it’s early with Max, and the sample size is pitifully small, I will say that I do perk up a little bit when I see plays like this, where he beats out an icing but then maintains possession of the puck and takes his time to make a play with it:

A lot of younger players would get that puck and just immediately slam it along the boards, trying to start a basic cycle deep in the zone, which isn’t a terrible play by any means, but it can be a very low-ceiling choice. It’s certainly not very exciting to watch, but it serves a purpose in every NHL game ever played.

This is why, for me, there is something to be said about a player who can hold onto the puck and find the open man, something Max did when he got his first career NHL assist. He came in with speed, backed the defence up, then held up and found Teddy KGB trailing behind him for the goal.

Max also moves his feet a lot on the ice and rotates without the puck constantly, which is one of Rick’s favourite things. He wants that movement to open up lanes and create space for puck movement.

Now that being said, Max is far from a sure thing. All it takes is him holding onto the puck a little too and losing the puck a little too much before he enters Nils Höglander territory and he’s constantly wondering when Patrik Allvin is going to tap him on the shoulder to have a quick chat with him. Sometimes an NHL coach likes the basics of getting pucks in deep and rotating the puck because it’s safe. Sure, that Pizza Bagel Hot Dog Ice Cream recipe you saw on Instagram looked amazing, but maybe chicken and rice is the way to go.

So, while I don’t know which, if either of them, will carve out an NHL career, I will say that as of now, if I had to put one of them in the lineup, I would want Max to have a go.

But I also gladly look forward to Bains scoring 30 goals two years from now, and me begging Canucks Army to delete this article.

Best chicken and rice approach

Canucks are playing very defensively sound hockey, just can’t generate long standing O zone time #Canucks

— Darrin Lessard (@dsardd) November 29, 2024

Win the battles on the boards, funnel the puck on net:

This was the Canucks approach for the majority of the game until they scored their first goal. Nothing too creative, and they certainly weren’t getting many high danger looks on net. As you can see in the clip, oftentimes there wasn’t even a player in front of Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen, so it wasn’t like he was battling through bodies to make sure he had eyes on the puck.

It was afternoon road hockey at its finest.

Not the fun road hockey where you have to yell “CAR” every 10 minutes, but a tired team playing hockey on the road. Simple hockey, not using too much energy, kind of waiting to see how things are going to play out. The same approach I use when I enter a Starbucks to get my mobile order. I don’t just bull rush the counter, I sit back and survey the land for a little bit to make sure my drink is ready so I’m not “that guy” who walks up to the counter and starts touching everyone’s stuff trying to find my name on a cup.

Best brief glimpse in time

That was one of Dakota Joshua's best shifts since returning to the #Canucks lineup.

— Rob Williams (@RobTheHockeyGuy) November 29, 2024

Dakota Joshua did not have a great game, let’s get that out of the way right now.

And clearly, he has every reason not to be up to speed yet, as he has not had nearly the same amount of time as everyone else has had to get acclimated to the NHL season. Remember how bad Pond Hockey October was for the majority of the Canucks? Dakota is still working that out of his system.

But Rob was right. There was one shift in which you saw the Dakota from last season, the one that got him a four year, 13 million dollar contract in the offseason:

He steals the puck and gets the puck to Garland, who sets up a Pius Suter chance, and then continues the shift playing heavy hockey, staying on top of the puck and constantly looking for ways to drag the puck towards the crease.

Other than that, however, he wasn’t much of a factor in the game, aside from getting beat pretty cleanly on the Sabres second goal. Offensively, he didn’t do much, and defensively, it looked like he was behind the play and was chasing the game a bit.

For me it looks like his conditioning isn’t quite there yet, which again, is understandable.

I will say, though, that it is a valid debate to have just in terms of what kind of player Dakota Joshua is going to end up being. The four year deal he got was based on two years of NHL output, specifically the one year playing with Conor Garland, so we don’t actually know what the Canucks have on their hands yet.

Best number two on the depth chart, number one in your hearts

Not me wondering who tf was ganging up on Zucker so much behind the Canucks net and then I realize it’s TYLER MYERS

— steph ⚔️ (@retro_steph) November 29, 2024

While we wait for Fil Hronek’s agent to text Rick Dhaliwal an update on the severity of his shoulder injury, all we know is he will be out “for a while.”

Which, of course, means the Chaos Giraffe is now the Canucks number one right-handed defenceman!

And honestly, he played like it Friday night:

This is the beauty of the Chaos Giraffe. Some plays he just does everything right. He uses his wingspan properly to close the gap, then uses his size properly to protect the puck, then he makes a smart play with the puck to get it over to a teammate, leading to a clean zone exit. That is about as textbook rush defence as you can get in hockey.

The problem is the odds are quite high that on the next shift he’s going to hip check his own goalie before going hitting someone into the bench and going bar down after the whistle. This is just life with Tyler Myers.

But the shifts when he puts it all together? Man, you see the player NHL GMs have, and will continue to, pay many millions of dollars for.

And sure, playing with Quinn Hughes is like showing up at school with LeBron James as your plus one for pick up basketball, but this wasn’t a night in which Quinn Hughes was bailing out Tyler Myers making terrible choices in life. CG57 played a solid, reliable 22 minutes of hockey for the Canucks, which is about all you can ask of him.

Can he keep it up over a long stretch of time? Who knows, it’s the Chaos Giraffe, he’s provocative, he gets the people going. All I know is it will be entertaining either way.

Best BC Buffalo Beatdown

#Canucks get scored on first for the 100000th time. Fuck.

— penguniz_69 (@Rossman_69_) November 29, 2024

Bowen Byram and Zach Benson combined to betray their home province when they opened the score for the Sabres:

Langley has enough issues going on that they shouldn’t have to be worrying about tearing down the Zach Benson posters on top of it as well.

Still, it’s a real nice goal from a guy who has been fantasy traded to Vancouver on HF Boards around 10,000 times in Bowen Byram, and a real nice pass from a player in Zach Benson who will be stuck in the Tom Willander “could have drafted instead” orbit for the next decade.

I particularly liked the juke Byram did on Elias Pettersson, who is no slouch when it comes to creating turnovers. Elias jumps up to snake the puck but Byram just boops right around him and starts the rush that ends in the eventual goal.

This goal probably doesn’t happen if Jake DeBrusk doesn’t make one of the weirdest-looking body checks I have ever seen, only to fall to the ground and immediately go into the “please don’t hit me with the puck” fetal position. By falling to the ice, the defensive coverage falls apart, as nobody really knows how to shift and cover for Jake, but we also have to give credit to Benson for taking full advantage of that situation.

If that’s me, I am picking the top corner and missing high and wide, and I just skate back to the bench and quietly hand in my resignation.

Benson, though? Brilliant back door tap-in pass.

Best first period summary

Some #Canucks thoughts so far:

-I’m sitting behind the Nucks net, decided to try and get a good look at our D pairings in their own zone with the shake up. I don’t want to talk about it.
-TYLER MYERS? TYLER MYERS FIRST PAIRING?
-Physicality is great. They just need one back.

— arielle (@ellycelly) November 29, 2024

Best everybody eats

#Canucks D ice time in first. Period included 2 mins of PK time
Hughes 8:12
Myers 7:26
Desharnais 6:38
Soucy 6:37
Brännström 6:05
Juulsen 5:12

— Jeff Paterson (@patersonjeff) November 29, 2024

The game actually ended with Quinn Hughes getting his customary 28 minutes, but to be fair, 27 of those were from one shift in overtime.

Best mini-hockey stick hockey skills

Corolla Garland, looking like a young Mario Bliznak, is just a really smart player, you know?

I don’t know of many players in the league right now who have made their lack of size work incredibly in their favour the way Garland has.

He uses his low centre of gravity to get his stick to the ice quickly, as seen above. It’s something he does beside the net often when he goes into mini-stick tap-in mode.

And he also uses his smaller size to dart in and out of scrums, getting to pucks and squeezing by spaces that others cannot.

Add in his incredibly high hockey IQ, and baby, you’ve got a stew going.

I have a feeling we are going to be seeing a few more Selke votes go his way before his career is all said and done.

Best Home Alone 5

#Canucks need to wake up. 20 down. 40 to go

— David Cee (@CanucksIn4) November 29, 2024

Kevin Lankinen is the steadying, consistent, reassuring step-father presence the Canucks need in their life right now:

Once again Tage Thompson is unable to find the net behind Lankinen.

Look, Uncle Arty was great, don’t get me wrong. Who didn’t enjoy a good Arty Party back in the day? But sometimes sneaking booze to the kids isn’t what a growing team needs, which is where Kevin enters the picture. While Thatcher is out getting smokes and a carton of milk, Kevin has stepped up to become the step-father this team deserves.

He won’t tell you what to do, he isn’t your father. But he’ll teach you how to drive and make sure you know you have a roof over your head whenever you need it.

Best do your dekes, bro

Petey nearly Datsyuk’d #canucks

— kevin (@kevinlambert23) November 29, 2024

The Canucks gave a slight wink that they remembered what exciting hockey looked like when Jake DeBrusk found Elias Pettersson all alone in front near the start of the second period:

Because he had to reach out to grab the puck, Elias runs out of room, but the fact he almost makes the Datsyuk work just speaks to his incredible skill level.

Again, not to use me as the barometer for failed plays, but if that had been me, I would have barely gotten the puck back before panicking and wildly passing the puck back to my blueline, before skating to the bench and quietly handing in my resigntation.

EP40 is good at hockey, is what I am saying. Guy almost deked out UPL in a phone booth.

I also kind of feel like Elias will be thinking about this play all night. If I know perfectionists who like to scream at themselves for any tiny mistake like I think I do, something tells me he will be replaying this miss in his head for about 48 hours straight.

Best slow your roll

Watching the Canucks being outplayed by the league's doormats it's becoming increasingly obvious that is going to be a lost season. #Canucks

— Kerry Banks (@bad_kicker) November 29, 2024

Last season the Canucks had a lot of things go their way, which I think raised the bar too high for this season if we’re being honest. That first half of last season almost every shot off the rush went into the net, the shooting percentage was insane, which gave us the false hope that the vaunted Rick Tocchet Arizona GOTI Hockey System had figured out offensive hockey.

But this season not going as well as people had initially hoped has also kind of set the bar too low right now?

The team is missing JT Miller, Thatcher Demko and Fil Hronek, and Brock Boeser is still getting back into form after his concussion. They are in the midst of a road trip that seems to be playing games in the morning in Buffalo and Detroit. I think we can cut them some slack, or at the very least, not use a period of hockey as proof that the season is lost.

That’s all I’m saying.

Should you be concerned about this team generating offence in the playoffs? Of course, they haven’t proven otherwise yet.

But to call it a lost season this early on is too reactive.

Anyways, here’s Kevin Lankinen stopping Tage Thompson again:

The Canucks are protecting the GOTI, the defensive coverage is solid, and Buffalo only ends up with a shot from distance with nobody in front of the goalie.

That’s good, solid hockey a team can play when they know their goalie is going to make those saves.

Best Operation: Dancin’ Danton

power plays are 8-3 for opponents since start of the Boston game. Hard to argue. #Canucks not doing much to force the issue these days

— Jeff Paterson (@patersonjeff) November 29, 2024

I am patiently waiting for Danton Heinen to score a goal off the rush so I can use the new nickname, and we were inches away from seeing that Friday ~~night~~ morning when Tyler Myers set up Danton with the shorthanded breakaway:

Again, Tyler Myers was making good plays that had nothing to do with the Quinn Hughes effect, give him credit.

And give Danton credit for at least hitting the net? I don’t know what I would have done there but clearly it would have ended with my quiet resignation.

Best let him cook

HOW did Myers miss that chanceeeeeee!? 😩😩😩😩😩#Canucks

— kelsylroberts (@kelsylroberts) November 29, 2024

Tyler Myers net front on PP 2 has long been a dream of mine, and the Canucks gave us the smallest glimpse of it on Friday:

With Hronek out, and the power play in general not being very efficient, what better time than now to try Tyler Myers on the second unit?

My only issue with his deployment is they need him to stand in front of the goalie and just bank passes and shots in off of him for this to work.

Sure, go for the tap ins once in a while, but the true power in the chaos giraffe setting up shop in front of the opposing goalie is how are they going to stop the puck when even Tyler has no idea what he’s going to do out there?

Besides, he’s a tall man. Think of how much longer it takes his brain to send signals to his hands to try a tap in like this, I saw a TikTok on this, it’s science.

You know who scores in that spot? That’s Conor Garland’s office. He would have been down on one knee, his stick an inch off the ice, tapping in that goal. Tyler Myers should be all about causing chaos in the crease, taking away the goalies eyes.

Tyler Myers doesn’t want to be fed.

He wants to hunt.

Best turning up the heat

i don’t think i can watch more of this game #canucks

— lu ⁴³ 🏒 (@bobochickens) November 29, 2024

Perhaps sensing they were losing the support of bobochickens, the Canucks finally started to lean on the gas a bit as the second period came to a close.

First you had Dakota Joshua just barely missing feeding Conor Garland all alone in front of UPL:

See, you can see it, Dakota Joshua is so close to putting it together. Last season he nails that pass and we’re all giggling about what an elite third line this team has. At least we can still nod our heads in respect to the fact that of course Garland still dove at the puck trying to make contact, the guy only knows how to play things at 11.

And what does someone who’s cranked the sound up to 11 do on a breakaway? Go full Tommy Vanek:

For all his good qualities, Garland isn’t blessed with a hard shot, nor does his mini-hockey stick provide enough leverage to torque out extra speed. It’s very much the Kyle Wellwood approach to hockey.

But he doesn’t let that get in the way for going for a bar down clapper in honor of Cody Hodgson’s game 8 miracle. He truly is one of us.

Best bang for your Brock

DeBrusk's goal is a perfect example of Brock Boeser's evolution as a two-way player over the years. It all started with Boeser's hard work to steal the puck away in the corner and set Suter up for the initial Grade-A chance #Canucks

— Harman Dayal (@harmandayal2) November 29, 2024

Brock Boeser is my poster child for work smarter, not harder, and as Harman points out, his defensive game has evolved streets ahead of where it was when he entered the league.

The Canucks first goal is a direct result of this 200 foot game, as he sneaks in and vultures the puck from the boards, then protects it as he drags it to the middle of the ice, drawing focus from three Sabres:

The end result? Mr. First String Quarterback Jake DeBrusk taps in the rebound goal off a Pius Suter shot.

I’ve pointed it out before, but Brock is one of the best Canucks for analyzing the action in front of him and knowing when the perfect time to jump in is. It’s something Pettersson and Garland do as well, it’s that high level thinking of knowing when you can sneak in to steal the puck from someone who isn’t expecting it. It can result in plays like this where all of a sudden a scrum along the boards turns into a puck being thrown on net before the other team has time to react.

Best Tyler Myers is here to help

I want a Sasson goal!!!

— erika 🫶🏻 (@playoffbeardy05) November 29, 2024

I am telling you, Chaos Giraffe was having himself a game.

No Hronek? No problem, Tyler Myers will head down low and try and feed Max out front:

Did the puck take a chaotic bounce to make that pass accurate? Of course it did, but what else did you expect.

Best hurt people hurt people

That's got to be on the softest calls I've ever seen against Pettersson while on the power play in the 3rd period of a tied game. What is that 😳 #Canucks

— NucksYVR (@nucksyvr) November 29, 2024

Beck Malenstyn got a rather large side eye from me when he fell from this “vicious” attack from Elias Pettersson:

If I exclaim out loud to my dog “what are we even doing here” it’s a good sign that a bad penalty was just assessed, and this might be one of the weakest of the season. In hockey you separate your guy from the puck, so I don’t know how Elias shoving a dude with his glove garners a cross-checking call, but here we are.

It just feels like an insult to Beck David Hansen, you know? He didn’t write Mellow Gold just to have Malenstyn ruin the good Beck name.

Luckily for Vancouver, step-dad Kevin knew just what his team needed; Timely saves:

See how Myers shoved Alex Tuch and he didn’t flail to the ice?

Best playing with fire

I don't think I would ever risk passing the puck backwards on a delayed penalty – I wouldn't want that video clip on my permanent record #Canucks #Sabres

— Greg P (@gregprzada17) November 29, 2024

Jake DeBrusk could never make an empty net prom Queen:

Some say the spirit of Kevin stopped that puck from going in on the delayed penalty.

Best peek-a-boo hockey

give me a team of 20 conor garlands and i'll give you 20 stanley cups

— Memarzadeh (@ArashMemarzadeh) November 29, 2024

After the Canucks decided scoring into their own net just wasn’t the kind of lifestyle they were looking for, they came out with a purpose on the powerplay that followed.

And when you add a cup of effort, a tablespoon of moxie, a dash of purpose, and a hockey player who utilizes strategies he devised from playing Metal Gear Solid and hiding in a box, you have yourself a recipe for a goal:

The entire sequence leading up to this goal was basically everyone on the ice for Vancouver winning puck battles. They were hard on the puck and made sure they kept the play in the offensive zone, and none was better than Elias Pettersson battling off a puck bobble to make sure he didn’t lose possession.

Eventually the puck found it’s way to Brock Boeser, and perhaps enraged by the previous BC on BC crime committed by Buffalo, he used their own tactics against them by going for the back door tap in over to Corolla Garland.

The best part is Garland starts in front of the net and just sort of slides out of frame, going full Poochie because his home planet needed him. He then just sets up shop, going low to the ground, and gives Brock Boeser the easy target for the tap in.

Somewhere Jim Benning is watching Garland this season screaming “THAT’S WHAT I WAS TALKING ABOUT.”

Best don’t Brock the boat baby

SO CLOSE BROCK🥹💜. #Canucks

— Sarah Laug (@nucksaid) November 29, 2024

With the Sabres having to kill off a second penalty due to a bottle based tantrum, Quinn Hughes almost set up Brock to make it 3-1 Canucks early in the third period:

That first goal kind of ignited the Canucks offensively, and while they weren’t turning into the 2011 Canucks out on the ice, they were at least starting to create offence and, more importantly, were generating some high-danger chances and goals.

Best in defence of Elias

Why on earth would you not take a shot on that? So frustrating #Canucks

— hammertime (@smma312) November 29, 2024

Elias Pettersson’s demise was exaggerated this season, as we have seen him recover and become the top level player we expected him to be.

But he is still fighting an uphill battle because it doesn’t take much for people to get frustrated with his lack of shooting this season:

I have been one of those critics in the past, as I have wanted to see him unleash hell on my command on many occasion, only to see him instead turn it into a pass. And I do think that earlier this season he was passing out of shots due to confidence issues, aka the Ben Simmons way of life.

But I will say I think this play was done intentionally and with some swagger. He gets the puck here and his shooting lane has a body in front of it, and he has a guy closing in on him, so he’s going to have to pick a corner. So rather than risk going full Mason Raymond, he tries to delay to draw in the two Sabres so he can find an open Conor Garland for the one timer.

It is very much a Henrik Sedin-type play, in which you risk mockery if your pass doesn’t work, but that’s just the risk you take with that lifestyle.

When Elias is at his best, he’s drawing in defenders and creating that room for his teammates, and I think here the visuals of him being in the slot and then his pass being picked off and turning into an odd-man rush just paints a negative picture of the entire sequence.

I just think we’ve seen Elias pull this type of play off plenty of times and nobody complains when it works.

Best stacking the pads

Garland is a fucking BEAUT #Canucks

— thalia (@mz_canuck) November 29, 2024

Not since Kirk McLean terrorized the city of Calgary have we seen a pad stacking this intense:

If you look up “hockey coaches favorite player” in the dictionary, you will find Conor Garland’s picture. Guy just straight up ran to the point to stack the pads and the end result was it turned into a breakaway goal for Pius Suter.

We’re at the point where I can’t even discount the theory that Garland stacked the pads in order to create that breakaway, it just feels like something he is staying after practice to perfect.

“Just one more time Joshua, just shoot the puck and let me stack the pads, I can dial this in, you never know.”

Best expert Kevin opinion on Kevin

It's good that the #Canucks have good Kevin again. It's been too many years since Kevin Bieksa was traded and we haven't had one since then.

— Hevy Kevy (@kevin_zeke) November 29, 2024

Kevin being Kevin:

The guy is just good at anticipating the play. He is very proactive and Artus Silovs feels very reactive. I think that’s the main difference for me. I feel like Kevin reads the ice much better and can anticipate the shots as a result of it.

Best here come the Sabres

#canucks don't know how to make things easy on themselves.

— Lafayette Post (@PostLafayette) November 29, 2024

Dakota Joshua just wanted to block the shot you see:

That’s a combination of Les Cousins Dangereux making a very smart play coupled with a fantastic shot, along with Dakota going all in on his shot block attempt and leaving himself no outs.

It’s also one of the rare times Kevin seems to lose his net a bit, as he is very far over in his crease on the goal.

And perhaps sensing the Canucks were on their heels a bit after the second goal, the Buffalo DJ continued to play WWE theme songs (I am not kidding) and I think it inspired Buffalo, as they almost scored on the next shift:

Nothing fancy, but the kind of shot that if Uncle Arty was in net, you’d be kind of worried. You’d have to glance away at the screen and maybe take a quick breather? Maybe check your fantasy football scores?

Kevin is pretty reliable, though.

Best keep on shooting

Upcoming collapse here #Canucks

— Roger Dodger ੴ (@nuckster_19) November 29, 2024

The problem with being reliable is that sometimes the puck bounces off of two people:

The Canucks have won plenty of games parking the bus, and sometimes it just doesn’t go your way. The Sabres are just tossing it on net here, hoping for a bounce, and this time they got it. There’s not much to scold on a play that ends with “and then on the second bounce it goes in off of Tuch’s helmet”.

Sometimes you generate your own luck just by pushing the pace.

Best overtime journey

Without this save, none of the overtime magic happens. We cannot overstate what a massive save this was from Kevin Lankinen on our old friend Tage Thompson:

With that said, you need to watch the entire video of the shifts from Garland and Hughes before we break down the overtime winner:

The Quinn Hughes and Conor Garland show in overtime supercut:

(They put on an absolute master class in puck possession) pic.twitter.com/4BmWvKfsAI

— Wyatt Arndt (@TheStanchion) November 29, 2024

I don’t know if I have seen a more dominant overtime from a team in the NHL in quite a while. Based purely on two players going out there and dominating puck possession like Garland and Hughes did. The play Hughes did on the game winner alone, much less the other three times he almost ended the game himself, is off the charts.

Even though we all know Quinn Hughes is a generational player, and clearly the Canucks best d-man of all time, there are still moments where I wonder if we underrate him as a player. He completely took over this game in the extra frame in a way normally reserved for when you put EA Sports on rookie mode.

Imagine having someone in your life like Quinn Hughes where no matter what problems you were dealing with, you knew you could hand it off to him and it would all be fine.

Conversely, imagine playing against him and wondering why you’re even on the same ice as him, much less the same league as him.

And Corolla Garland, I don’t even know if I have words for him right now.

Remember that earlier missed tap in from Myers? And how that wasn’t his office? It’s because the CEO of the blue paint is clearly Conor Garland:

He straight up goes mini-stick hockey mode, and when he doesn’t get the initial tap in, he re-positions himself and tucks the puck between his own legs for the goal. The guy drops to like an inch off the ground so he can cover as much of the ice as possible, and ends up tapping the puck in as a result of it. He basically got two goals on the night by making himself the biggest target on the ice.

Again, nobody utilizes their small stature to be an advantage quite like Garland does. I don’t know if many players will do the things Garland does in order to make a play on the puck. Stacking the pads, superman diving for pucks, dropping down to the ice in mini-stick hockey mode, if there is a will, there is a way for Conor. He just never quits.

If Quinn Hughes is the beauty of hockey at its finest, a man who makes things look so easy, then Conor Garland is the work horse of everything, showing you what grim determination in a color coordinated turtleneck can accomplish.

The end result, a three point night for Garland, and Quinn Hughes has tied Alex Edler for most assists ever by a Canucks defenceman.

Team leader in points? Quinn Hughes at 25 points.

Second in points and tied for most goals? Conor Garland, 8 goals, 21 points.

We’ve come a long way from Jiri Slegr and Jim Sandlak.

Best he’s not wrong

if dominik hasek was a forward you'd get conor garland

— kwïn hüz (@riotsurvivor) November 29, 2024

It’s honestly kind of true. Using your body to do things others don’t, that’s the Hasek way.

Best generational talent

Quinn Hughes has just tied Alex Edler's #Canucks record for career assists as a dman at 310.

Hughes – 387 games
Edler – 925 games

— 𝗜𝗮𝗻𝘄 🇨🇦 (@ianwcanucks) November 29, 2024

Too early to retire his number and get his Hall of Fame spot picked out?

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