Canucks vs. Oilers: Silov or DeSmith, who’s your goalie for Game 2?

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Can you really change your goalie after a win?

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To hear Vancouver Canucks coach Rick Tocchet talk about it Thursday, he may do that.

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Arturs Silovs started Game 1 for the Canucks, a 5-4 win over the Edmonton Oilers.

But after a trio of strong performances to help guide his team to a first-round series win over the Nashville Predators, he was far from convincing in Game 1 against Edmonton.

He struggled with tracking the puck. Even if you set aside each of the four Edmonton goals for one reason or another — screens, deflections — you can point to the moments like in the third period where a pass went through his legs and almost went into the net.

Too often he was slow in his reads and poorly executed his positioning.

And so his coach didn’t shy away from a question about where his process is at for who will start in goal for Vancouver on Friday at Rogers Arena. Silovs or could it be Casey DeSmith, who played in Games 2 and 3 against Nashville before suffering a mysterious injury that put Silovs in the crease for Game 4.

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Silov is the incumbent, the coach admitted. To be …

“He’s earned the right, right now, to play, but that doesn’t mean you know, we haven’t officially made a (decision),” Tocchet said. “The one thing we have: We have Casey, and Casey competed. You know, he could play tomorrow.”

Whatever the injury was, Tocchet said he thought DeSmith was back to 100 per cent.

“I think he’s past it, so he is definitely a viable option for us,” he said.

How’s that for hockey-fan fodder for the next 24 hours or so?

In the big picture, who plays in goal for Vancouver isn’t that important, unless it’s Thatcher Demko.

Demko is clearly the better goalie. His season, with a Vezina Trophy nomination, is testament to this.

It’s not just that he’s taller than both Silovs and DeSmith, it’s that he is more agile and simply a more talented game reader.

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But he’s not here, out with a suspected knee injury, still unlikely to play before the end of the current series.

Whether it’s DeSmith or Silovs in goal, the real story will be determined by how the Canucks defend in front of their goalie.

The way they defended against Connor McDavid on Wednesday was a case in point — for the first time in his NHL career, McDavid didn’t record a single shot on goal in a playoff game.

The world’s greatest player was kept in check.

The towering duo of Carson Soucy and Tyler Myers had a lot to do with that, but so did JT Miller’s line.

With Myers or the Miller line on the ice against McDavid, the Canucks took about two-thirds of the shot attempts. That’s not the kind of figure you are used to seeing for McDavid.

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Soucy said Thursday that much of this success was down to the up-ice work by the Canucks’ forwards. They were quick to take space away from McDavid and his teammates, he said.

“I think our forwards all night just did a good job of kind of being in front of them while they’re trying to wind up their speed,” he said.

Tocchet has long harped on his forwards to defend by skating forward, to take away the space rather than give it up.

McDavid, of course, thrives with even an inch of space and through one game, anyway, the Canucks did well at that.

Soucy said the Canucks did a good job of limiting the Oilers to one-and-down opportunities when they did gain the zone.

Rather than allowing repeated chances on rebounds, the Canucks smartly collected the puck and then turned play back up ice.

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It’s how they overcame giving up four goals.

That’s not a great recipe for long-term success, of course, but the Canucks made it work tonight.

But in Game 2, they can’t expect to win again 5-4.

And that brings us back to Silovs and DeSmith.

Whoever starts must put in a credible performance. There are going to be terrible bounces, you can’t control those.

Control the things you can. Manage your crease. Be quick to set up and face the threat.

Tocchet said he would be meeting with Canucks director of goaltending Thursday afternoon, to go over what they see from Silovs on Wednesday and to determine if they should stick with the young netminder or swap back to the veteran DeSmith.

And until then, we’ll just have to wait, and ponder.

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