Thatcher Demko’s Re-Entry Is A Process — For Him And The Canucks

When Thatcher Demko stopped speedy Cole Koepke on a breakaway on Saturday night, his glove save should have set off a thunderous roar from the faithful at Rogers Arena.

But by the two-minute mark of the third period, the crowd had thrown in the towel. Barely a minute earlier, David Pastrnak had beaten Demko on a sneaky wraparound for his fourth point of the night and put the Boston Bruins up 5-0.

“Couple of flukey goals, not his fault,” said Rick Tocchet about his goaltender's performance after the game. "You're hoping we'd play a little bit better in front of him, especially at the start of the first period.”

Despite losing the first two games of their current road swing by a combined score of 13-2, the Bruins utterly dominated the first 20 minutes of action. They outshot Vancouver 16-4, with 12 high-danger chances at 5-on-5 compared to none for the Canucks, according to Natural Stat Trick.

On an early power play, Canucks antagonist Brad Marchand converted a spectacular cross-crease feed from former Canuck Elias Lindholm to open the scoring. Less than three minutes later, Morgan Geekie got a gift in the slot from David Pastrnak, which proved to be the game winner.

“Thatcher is an amazing goalie,” said Quinn Hughes. “I felt like we obviously didn't bring the level of compete, where we need to play, to give him a chance.”

For opponents, Demko's status presents an opportunity to get into his kitchen and try to make him uncomfortable.

“We didn’t want to make it easy on him and we wanted to get the bodies in front and get some shots on early,” Pastrnak said. “He’s a great goaltender, but, you know, missing so much time, it’s never easy.”

Even as the game wore on, the Canucks struggled to create dangerous scoring chances. Their first power play, early in the second, produced no shots — and a smattering of boos from the crowd. Boston was up by five before Vancouver finally broke Jeremy Swayman’s shutout bid midway through the third when J.T. Miller dished to Max Sasson for his first career NHL goal.

In the past, Demko has been notoriously private about his injury issues — to the point where he has been reluctant to admit if he has had surgical procedures, or which body parts were involved. That was even the case last spring when he was knocked out of the playoffs after just one game.

At training camp in September, Demko took a rare path when he let the media know that progress was being made on the treatment of his rare knee injury — eventually identified to be to his popliteus muscle in the back of the knee. By late November, he felt close to a return. He was activated on Dec. 6, when the Canucks started their current homestand, and after backing up Kevin Lankinen for two games he got his first action of the year against the Blues last Tuesday — a 4-3 overtime loss that saw the Canucks erase a 3-1 deficit to get a point, but lose after Dylan Holloway flew down the right wing and took the puck to the net.

“Felt rusty for sure,” said Demko after Tuesday's game. “Obviously, it's frustrating losing. I thought I could have played a couple goals differently. I'm sure that there's stuff that I can pull, to keep building.”

According to Natural Stat Trick, Demko faced 2.69 expected goals in all situations against the Blues, and gave up four. Against the Bruins, it was five goals compared to 3.18 expected goals against.

There’s definitely still room for improvement for the 2024 Vezina Trophy runner-up, whose 22 goals saved above expected according to MoneyPuck.com ranked second in the NHL last season, behind only the eventual Vezina winner, Connor Hellebuyck.

Lankinen did not dress for Saturday’s game due to an illness that is running through the team. If he’s well enough, he’ll likely get the nod to close out the Canucks’ current homestand against the Colorado Avalanche on Monday — because he’s coming off a shutout of the Florida Panthers, and because the coaching staff will take care not to overload Demko and risk another injury after such a long layoff.

His next chance to pick up his first win will likely come on the road next week, where Vancouver has been a fantastic 10-2-1 this season. They’ll visit Delta Center in Salt Lake City for the first time to take on Utah on Wednesday, then see the Vegas Golden Knights on Thursday.

“All he's got to do is just keep going,” said Hughes. “And we’ve got to find a way to perform better.”

Get the latest news and trending stories right to your inbox by subscribing to The Hockey News newsletter here. And share your thoughts by commenting below the article on THN.com or by visiting our forum.