Sherwood sees parallels with Vancouver Canucks and U2-skipping Predators
If there’s anyone who knows where the Vancouver Canucks go from here, it’s Kiefer Sherwood.
The energy forward was part of last year’s Nashville Predators team, which turned their season around. On February 15, they sat 22nd in the league standings, five points out of the last playoff spot. The poor play caused their team trip to see U2 at the Sphere in Las Vegas to be cancelled, which proved to be a catalyst for the better.
Things improved, and they went 20-6-3 the rest of the way. The Predators entered the postseason as one of the NHL’s hottest teams, although they lost in the first round.
Right now, the Canucks are one point outside a playoff spot. An optimist can find a lot of parallels between this Canucks team and last year’s Predators. It provides hope that once the group puts pieces into place, they can start a quick run up the standings.
“It was kind of similar, we didn’t really find an identity until [the win streak]. It took a lot of failures for us to finally click in how we wanted to play and what kind of identity we wanted to play with,” Sherwood told Daily Hive in an exclusive interview.
“I think we’re kind of searching for that right now, and once we all buy in and figure it out, we’ll be going in the right direction.”
The vibes around the Canucks aren’t great right now, especially after being outscored 11-2 in their last two games. They’ve won just two of their last 10 games, and they’re searching for answers.
“No one is playing to the standard that we expect and that we want. There’s no one that wants it more than the guys in this room… every season has adversity, and we’re going through some right now, but how we get through is going to determine how well the season goes.”
Taking a closer look at the team’s recent play, there are some positives to be had despite the run of poor results. The Canucks defied the odds, including a hectic travel day that saw them land in Toronto just a few hours before puck drop, to beat the Maple Leafs 3-0 last week. It was an impressive defensive performance against a team with a ton of firepower.
Even the 2-1 overtime defeat to the Washington Capitals had plenty of strong moments against the NHL’s best team: fewer blown assignments and more engaged players. While it gets chalked up in the loss column, there are signs of progress.
“I do think that there are good building blocks that we have to take, but we’ve got to apply them. We can’t just keep saying that they’re good games and losing; we’ve got to apply it. Just dig our heels in the sand, say enough is enough, because we do have a good group in here, a lot of good players, some world-class players.”
With every additional defeat, the pressure builds on the Canucks, both internally and externally. The noise continues to ramp up, and their pathway to the playoffs becomes more difficult. The clock is ticking on this team finding its identity.
“We can’t divide right now — if anything, it’s a time for us to be even closer and rely on each other even more… the urgency needs to be now because you can’t keep spiralling. We’ve got to put an end to it and start going in the right direction.”