Demko leads new-look Canucks to second straight win

In this brave, new world since the Vancouver Canucks traded the best player in franchise history, they have built their first winning streak in nearly two months, all three of their new players have contributed, and the team is two-thirds of the way to a Metro New York sweep despite generating 32 shots on goal in 120 minutes.

“Yeah, you know, trying to impress them a little bit,” goalie Thatcher Demko joked about the guys who arrived from the Minnesota Wild. “Obviously, vibes are higher when you’re winning and guys are feeling good. I mean, I don’t have to spell that out for you guys; it’s more fun these last couple of games.”

Predicting that sensation, fun, would have been as shocking as Friday’s trade of Canucks captain Quinn Hughes.

Fourth-line winger Liam Ohgren, one of the three under-25 players sent to the Canucks by the Wild, scored his first National Hockey League goal since last March as Vancouver shut out the New York Rangers 3-0 Tuesday at Madison Square Garden.

Newcomers Marco Rossi and Zeev Buium were on the scoresheet Sunday when the Canucks edged the New Jersey Devils 2-1.

The grim reality of Friday’s trade has evaporated, for now, with the enthusiasm of the new Canucks, eager to please and grateful for greater opportunities in Vancouver, as well as the clarity the transaction has provided to a last-place team.

And despite their struggle to create offence without Hughes carrying the puck all over the ice and setting up teammates, Vancouver has continued to improve the defensive game that sharpened up significantly over the last four weeks.

But, really, the biggest difference on this road trip so far is that Demko, three games back from a month-long absence due to his latest injury, is already creeping close to peak form. And there aren’t many goalies who play at a higher level than the veteran Canucks starter.

Demko is the human tank-buster, the goalie who is simply too good for the team to be the worst in the NHL. If the 30-year-old stays healthy, especially if players continue to apply coach Adam Foote’s defensive principles, the Canucks can’t possibly remain where they are in the standings.

They may not move up much, may never get within two time zones of the wild-card playoff race, but they are going to finish above some teams with the 2024 Vezina Trophy runner-up in their net.

“He’s the best in the world,” teammate and friend Conor Garland, who is admittedly biased but not far off, said after his 160-foot empty-netter clinched Tuesday’s win. “I don’t think that’s even a dispute, really. He’s just so sound and so big and his reaction time. . . that tip Millsy (ex-Canuck J.T. Miller) had late in the third, you tip that as a forward and you think that’s in every time. So it’s fantastic to have him back. I think his presence in the room is something really important. He’s a competitor, he’s a winner. His focus and preparation is good for some guys to see what consistency looks like.”

Demko tracked and caught Miller’s redirection. The goalie stopped all eight shots by Artemi Panarin, including a couple of point-blank chances, and foiled Vincent Trocheck twice from the slot.

He stopped 24 shots for his first shutout of the season. He made it look easy.

“I mean, it’s a hard league,” Demko said. “There’s no easy games, so I’m not going to sit here and say the game was easy by any means. But, you know, a lot of this is just kind of how we’re playing, too. I think we’ve actually been playing really well the last 10 days here. So it was good to do my job tonight, and guys did theirs.

“We’ve won two in a row. It feels good. You know, we’re trying to win every time we go on the ice. That’s been the focus all year, and that’ll be the focus in a couple days on Long Island.”

The Canucks pass the midpoint of their five-game pre-Christmas trip Friday against the New York Islanders.

“When a goalie is seeing it like that, the D just do their job,” Foote said. “They let him have the strong-side shot because they know Demmer’s there. It gives all our players a lot of confidence.”

Evander Kane took advantage of an accidental pick by linesman Devin Berg to open scoring Tuesday on a breakaway just 1:46 into the game. With Kane rushing down the right-wing, Berg swung away from the boards as defenceman Matthew Robertson was closing and picked the Ranger, allowing the Canuck to skate in alone and outwait goalie Jonathan Quick to make it 1-0.

Berg was as much a victim as Robertson and, in fairness to the respected official, Robertson later toe-picked himself to the ice to allow Ohgren another breakaway, so maybe the Ranger has an equilibrium issue.

Ohgren was stopped on his free pass, but not before the new Canuck scored his first NHL goal in nearly nine months by firing one-on-one from the top of the circle and rattling the puck through Quick to make it 2-0 at 3:24 of the second period.

The 21-year-old former first-round pick did not have a point in 18 games for the Wild this season.

“Yeah, it feels really good,” he said. “I’ve been working hard for that one, and it’s nice to get two out of two wins here in Vancouver.”

In trying to move past the Hughes trade, the timing of this surge couldn’t be better for Vancouver.

Like Demko said, winning is fun. And it has been a while since the Canucks had fun.

“We lost our captain, and I think for us as a group, it’s important to come together and play these kinds of games,” veteran defenceman Marcus Pettersson said. “They’re tight games, maybe not a ton of offence. But you know what? We’re battling for each other, and we know that if we’re going to win games, we’ve got to do it together. It’s nice to string a couple (of wins) together. But especially when a major turnover like that happens — I’ve never gone through it myself where a key player like that gets traded — it’s a new challenge, and I think we’re coming together as a group.”

Foote said: “It’s a bonus, for sure, if you can get off to a good start with the new guys and get them feeling good about themselves as well. You lose your captain, a guy that’s been here a long time and, you know, it’s hard on a lot of our guys. It’s a big thing. But you have to move forward and play hockey; that’s your job. It’s good to get those two wins.”