Conclusion: The missed opportunity against Utah weighs on the Canucks with the loss against Vegas

The Vancouver Canucks lost a hockey game on Thursday. But they lost their road trip last night.

With the Canucks playing against rested teams on consecutive nights, it became increasingly unlikely that they would win the second game against the Vegas Golden Knights.

The Golden Knights, sometimes strangely underrated but always strong, are 12-3 in Las Vegas and have devoured National Hockey League opponents in the third period. They did it again on Thursday against the Canucks, scoring two goals in the final period to beat Vancouver 3-1 after the visitors scored first and led 1-0 by the end of the second period.

Apart from the final result, it was a good away game from a tired team against a strong opponent. But it was still a loss – as it always was likely to be.

The regret that will remain with the Canucks after their two-game road trip is the point they squandered on Wednesday when they took a 2-0 lead in the third period against Utah – another team you can’t should have been underestimated – wasted and lost 3-2 in extra time when a series of errors allowed Mikhael Sergachev to snatch victory twelve seconds before the penalty shootout.

This was a game the Canucks “should have” won. If they had done that, they would have been playing with house money in Vegas. Instead, there was a need to get something from the Golden Knights during their visit on Thursday. And they definitely played well enough to get something.

But Canuck goaltender Kevin Lankinen, who has been outstanding since the start of the season, missed Alex Pietrangelo’s hard but unshielded 50-foot throw past his blocker as the Knights tied the score at 1-1 with 2:25 left in the second period. And William Karlsson scored the winning goal out of nowhere at 3:44 of the third period when he beat Canuck Pius Suter with the puck from the sideline, fired a sharp angled shot at Lankinen from close range and then scored on his own rebound.

With 50 seconds left, Brett Howden added an empty-net goal after Elias Pettersson lost the ball.

The Canucks’ only goal came on a revamped fourth line when Teddy Blueger beat Vegas goaltender Adin Hill with a rebound after Kiefer Sherwood was stopped following a slick setup by Danton Heinen.

So the 16-10-6 Canucks stalled and stalled again, losing consecutive road games for the first time this season. Vancouver is 2-3-2 in its last seven games and 9-8-3 since winning the California tour six weeks ago.

Their last chances to feel better over the Christmas break are Saturday’s home games against the Ottawa Senators and Monday against the San Jose Sharks. Anything less than two wins will be a disappointment.

Perhaps the main reason for Canucks coach Rick Tocchet’s unusual decision to separate JT Miller and Elias Pettersson on the power play is so obvious that it was overlooked: Maybe he’s simply trying to water down his struggling players in the hopes that the power play can still work with one of them.

Miller and Pettersson combined for zero shots on Thursday, the same number of goals they have scored in their last five games combined. Pettersson didn’t score a point in that span, which embarrassingly began with Miller’s return from a 10-game leave of absence. And while Miller had two assists in his first game, he has just one assist since then and hasn’t had an assist in the last three games.

But the Canucks’ offensive failure doesn’t end with them. Brock Boeser is pointless in his last four games, as is Jake DeBrusk, and Conor Garland is pointless in five games. Vancouver’s top five forwards have combined for one assist in the last four games (Miller’s meaningless helper in last Saturday’s 5-1 loss to the Boston Bruins).

This isn’t so much a crisis between Miller and Pettersson, who, while not close, have developed so well over the last five seasons in Vancouver that Miller was re-signed two years ago for $56 million , while Pettersson re-signed to the Canucks last season for $92.8 million. The relationship has made every elite center successful and wealthy.

The crisis is that the Canucks’ top team suddenly disappeared from the scoring charts last week.

Considering that no one from the top group is scoring – and Thursday’s power play went 0-2 and failed to put a shot on net when Karlsson had a two-minute lead, right after Karlsson scored – it does little point in maintaining this separation of Miller and Pettersson.

Pietrangelo’s goal stands out in part because Lankinen has been outstanding for the Canucks this season, her team’s MVP in 30 games when Quinn Hughes was not with the team. Unless the shot hit DeBrusk’s stick well ahead of Lankinen – and replays and Canucks analyst Dave Tomlinson suggested it didn’t – it’s a goal he hasn’t allowed often since arriving in Vancouver this fall .

In the loss in Utah, the Canucks’ All-Star goaltender also did not look good, despite Thatcher Demko’s general effectiveness, especially in Vancouver’s leaden first half, allowing two of three goals.

But he’s only four games into his return from a serious knee injury. And Lankinen is still human after looking superhuman at times in the first two months of the season. Questionable goals are achieved.

Of course, neither goaltender is to blame for their road loss this week and the Canucks’ struggling offense leaves Demko and Lankinen almost no room for error. But we expect a lot from this goaltending tandem, which should be one of the best in the NHL. They do that too.

Two months and two days since he scored his second of two goals this season, Nils Hoglander was injured in Tocchet’s 32nd game in Vegas. The winger had a breakthrough 24-goal season last year that earned him a new contract that will pay him $9 million over the next three years.

Tocchet also cut rookie Max Sasson and gave minor league call-ups Phil Di Giuseppe and Linus Karlson, who were injured most of the season, their first NHL games of the year.

Karlsson’s 10:45 of ice time was the lowest on the team and Di Giuseppe’s 12:58 was the third lowest.

When the Canucks scored first this season, they have now lost more games than they have won: 7-4-5. Last season, they led the league with a record of 38-11-4 after going 1-0. . . Di Giuseppe led the Canucks with five goals, but Sherwood finished the game with three, continuing his unprecedented NHL streak of three or more goals in each of his first 32 games. . . Shots on Thursday were just 21-20 for Vegas. Over the last eight games, the Canucks have averaged just 22.1 shots. . . The Heinen-Blueger-Sherwood line was easily the Canucks’ best, outscoring the Knights 8-1 at five-on-five.

Blueger: “I think there is not much difference between winning and losing. Of course it hurts to give up so late in the second round. Just good margins.”