Brock Boeser adjusting to Canucks’ centre woes: ‘It’s hard’

LOS ANGELES — Brock Boeser has seven primary assists this season, and the five centres he has played with on the Vancouver Canucks’ second line have none.

Without a National Hockey League playmaker down the middle, winger Conor Garland had been creating scoring chances for Boeser from the opposite side of the line, but now Garland is hurt, too.

“That’s the definition of this year,” Boeser lamented after Monday’s practice in El Segundo, Calif. “I mean, it’s hasn’t been the greatest of luck. And finally, when you start to get some confidence, something like this happens.”

After missing Saturday’s 2-1 overtime loss to the Los Angeles Kings with an undisclosed injury, Garland was scheduled to fly home to Vancouver Monday afternoon for further medical evaluation while the Canucks travelled to Denver to take on the force of nature that is the Colorado Avalanche.

At 10-13-3, the Canucks are not yet through the first third of their season, and Garland is already out of the lineup for the third time after missing only two games the last three years.

With Boeser now playing left wing for the first time in his career, Kiefer Sherwood is the new second-line right winger alongside centre David Kampf, who does not yet have a point in six games since joining the Canucks following his contract termination in Toronto.

An experienced, respected fourth-line NHL centre, Kampf has spent the last five games in the middle of the Canucks’ second line.

Filip Chytil started the season as the second-line centre and scored three goals before suffering another serious concussion in Game 6. Bottom-six centre Teddy Blueger was injured the same game. Neither has played since.

Between Chytil and Kampf, inexpensive pickup Lukas Reichel had 12 games at second-line centre before playing himself right out of coach Adam Foote’s lineup. There was also one game for Aatu Raty and two for Max Sasson, both recent graduates of the American Hockey League.

As CanucksArmy.com reported, in 26 games, the Canucks’ various second-line centres have contributed one secondary assist — a defensive-zone point for Reichel in a Nov. 8 win against the Columbus Blue Jackets.

Say what you want about Canucks president Jim Rutherford, but the Hall-of-Fame manager was excruciatingly accurate when he said after last season that Vancouver needed to add a top-six centre and that it would be expensive, “but it’ll also be very expensive not to get one.”

The team never acquired one, and here it is three points from the bottom of the NHL.

It’s hard for the Canucks to feel positive these days, although the energy and enthusiasm of Nils Hoglander in his first practice since pre-season ankle surgery helped the mood on Monday.

“It is hard,” Boeser said. “Like, it’s hard. But we’re coming to the rink. . . I think we’ve played some good games. Guys show up and work hard, and we’re following our structure, and then we’ll lose a tight game. I feel like that’s happened a lot. And after it happens to you a few times, it gets frustrating.

“When I was playing with a guy like Gar, you know, he’s really good at creating space for himself and for others. He’s such a good playmaker. That’s kind of where I think we’ve gotten a lot of those (scoring) chances, but obviously he’s hurt now.

“I do feel like I’ve been making a lot of plays — more so than in past years when I was playing with J.T. (Miller) all the time. That was a little different. I do feel like I’ve created a lot of stuff, but I don’t think I have a secondary assist yet. They’re all primary, which is crazy. But, I mean, it doesn’t really change anything. Like, I’ve got to shoot the puck. I know I need to score goals for our team. . . and it doesn’t matter who’s in the middle. I’ve got to show up and try to have a good game and try to produce and not get scored on.”

Considering who has been available as Boeser’s centre, the longest-tenured Canuck is actually having a decent season with nine goals and seven assists in the 24 games he has played.

But the Canucks have just two wins in their last 10 games (2-5-3), and in the last eight, Boeser has one goal. The 28-year-old, however, has had a pile of scoring chances among his 21 shots on target during this time.

He looked dangerous in all three games in California, where the Canucks went 1-1-1.

“I’ve been right there,” Boeser said. “When you’re getting chances, that means you’re close. When you’re not getting chances, that’s when I know I’ve got problems.”

Minus a major move by Allvin for centre, Boeser making a U-turn in the hour before free agency opened on July 1 and re-signing in Vancouver for seven years and $50.75 million was the biggest hockey news of the summer on the West Coast.

But things haven’t quite gone as Boeser and Canucks had hoped.

The critical mass of injuries, headlined by starting goalie Thatcher Demko and two of the team’s three NHL-proven centres, contributed to inconsistency in systems play. And since general manager Patrik Allvin informed other teams that the Canucks are willing to move their UFA-eligible players, trade conjecture is becoming deafening. Sherwood, the team’s leading goal-scorer with 12, has been at the epicentre of rumours whirlwind.

“To be honest, I haven’t really heard much because I’m not really on social media,” Boeser said. “I’ve overheard some of it. I know it can be tough. I’ve gone through (trade rumours) and I’ve had a lot of noise around me, and it can be hard. As much as you don’t want to think about it, it’s definitely in the back of your head and might affect you a little bit. But at the end of the day, it’s part of the business, and you’ve got to push forward and push through.”

Two months into his seven-year extension, is Boeser worried where the Canucks might be headed?

“If my brain tries to go there. . . I try not to go there just because we’ve been dealt with some tough luck,” he said. “You know, look at our centres. We’ve had Heats and Teddy out pretty much the entire year. That hurts. Those guys are important pieces to our team, and I thought we were playing some good hockey when we did have those guys in the lineup. You know, I think everyone’s trying hard. Even last game, I thought we worked hard and we were right there. We just ended up on the wrong side of it.”

• With minor-league callup Nikita Tolopilo summoned home for the birth of his child, the Canucks recalled goalie Jiri Patera to join them in Colorado and back up Kevin Lankinen.

HOW THE CANUCKS PRACTISED

Kane-Pettersson-Lekkerimaki
Boeser-Kampf-Sherwood
O’Connor-Sasson-DeBrusk
Bains-Raty-Karlsson

Hughes-Hronek
M. Pettersson-Myers
Pettersson Jr.-Willander

Hoglander (non-contact)
Reichel
Joseph