Canucks’ home-ice woes continue in loss to Sharks: ‘Not good enough’

VANCOUVER — “Come out to the Coast, we’ll get together, have a few laughs.”

It’s easy to imagine the Vancouver Canucks sounding sarcastically like John McClane, Bruce Willis’ besieged and bloodied character from the movie Die Hard.

Every time the Canucks come home to Vancouver, it’s like, “Sure, get the fans behind us, use home ice to our advantage, have a few wins.”

In their final home game of 2025, the Canucks were beaten 6-3 Saturday by the San Jose Sharks, one of the teams that still looks catchable for Vancouver in the National Hockey League standings. Nearly three months since this season began, the Canucks have won four times at Rogers Arena.

They are 4-11-1 on home ice this season. It’s like they’re playing in Nakatomi Plaza.

After going 4-1 on their pre-Christmas road trip, improving their away record to a commendable 11-8-2 (only three teams had more road wins coming out of the holiday break), the Canucks lost in Vancouver for the sixth time in seven games.

And although there was an unlucky own-goal and a strange non-call (and non-challenge) on what appeared to be pretty clear goaltender interference on the Sharks’ first goal, Vancouver fully earned the defeat.

After four days off, the Canucks were flat at the start, a step behind the speedy Sharks for most of the first two periods, and were outshot 37-27 by a team that had lost its previous three games by an aggregate score of 16-7.

“It’s not good enough,” Conor Garland, one of the Canucks who was good enough, muttered post-game. “We deserved the outcome. Just didn’t make enough plays, you know. I don’t think we got to the net enough either. I just didn’t think we were good overall.”

After three weeks of improved defensive play, when the Canucks allowed just 23.5 shots per game over a 10-game spell even as they descended to the bottom of the NHL standings, Vancouver has yielded 119 shots on goal over their last three games. Including Saturday’s empty-netter, opponents have scored 15 times.

“Early on in the year, we gave up a lot, too,” defenceman Marcus Pettersson said. “I just think we’ve got to be tighter to our checks. Sometimes we get a little hesitant, thinking you want to protect (an area) and you get too far away from your check. That last goal was a prime example. I’m protecting the front (of the net), but I get a little bit too far away from (Macklin) Celebrini and it gives him room to shoot. So, yeah, we’ve given up a lot. A lot of it is turnovers, too.”

Celebrini, the 19-year-old from North Vancouver who has become a lock for the Canadian Olympic team, was the best player on Saturday, finishing with a goal and assist, eight shots on target and 16 attempts over 21:47 of ice time.

Faster, sharper and more determined than the Canucks at the start, the Sharks led 2-0 within eight minutes and won wire to wire, although Vancouver did cut a two-goal deficit in half three times.

The Canucks never recovered from the contentious opening goal when Ryan Reaves bulldozed the puck into the net from under goalie Thatcher Demko’s glove at 6:11 of the first period. A deflected puck trickled behind the goalie, but Demko located it in time and reached back with his blocker and appeared to have the puck covered before Reaves steamrolled through with his stick.

Referee Graham Skilliter called a good goal on the ice and, more surprisingly, Canuck coach Adam Foote, after consulting with his staff, chose not to challenge that dubious interpretation even after Demko had raised his hand immediately after the scrambled goal.

During the television timeout that soon followed the goal, Demko skated straight to the bench to speak with Foote. Twice.

“I mean, when I found it, I got my hand on top of it and swept it out,” the goalie said of the play. “And then he pushed my entire arm in the net. I mean, you see challenges where guys are jabbing legs and whatever else in the net, and they usually get called back.”

Demko said he thought the Canucks should have challenged the goal.

Foote said: “It was hard to see on that (camera) angle if he had it completely covered, but our guys didn’t think it was going to get called back.”

Sometimes coaches call for a review just to show his players or, specifically, his goalie that he has their back. But Saturday wasn’t that time for Foote.

A master at compartmentalization — as most goalies are — Demko looked out of sorts when the game restarted and was sliding to his right, guessing behind a moving screen, when John Klingberg’s wrister from the point beat him to his left to make it 2-0 at 7:55.

Demko said the second goal had nothing to do with the first.

“I didn’t like the second one,” he said of his performance. “Didn’t love the fourth one. I thought we should have challenged the first one. Tough bounce on the third one. But yeah, I thought I just had to play better. I thought I did some things good and some things bad.”

“Thatcher wasn’t an issue tonight,” Foote said, protecting his goalie post-game. “It was more of we just weren’t ready to start. You can’t cruise into a game, and we got caught a little bit.”

The Canucks got goals from Linus Karlsson on the power play, Drew O’Connor shorthanded, and Marco Rossi at even strength, the latter’s first in six games with Vancouver since Quinn Hughes was traded to the Minnesota Wild.

But the centre also scored an own-goal, putting the Sharks up 3-1 at 12:38 of the second period, when he tried to clear a puck that hopped up off William Eklund’s stick in the Vancouver slot, but instead bumped it over Demko and into the net.

“There was a lot that happened (with the trade), but I think we’ve been able to digest it a little bit,” Pettersson said. “We should have had more jump tonight.”

• After missing eight games with an undisclosed injury, top centre Elias Pettersson returned to the Canucks lineup. He had three shots on net but finished minus-three over 20:47 of ice time. . . Centre Filip Chytil, out since Oct. 19 due to the latest in a series of serious concussions, skated with teammates Saturday morning in a non-contact jersey.