Kevin Lankinen did half the work on a Canucks goal against the Oilers last night, and the scoresheet gave him nothing for it.
The sequence started in his own crease. The Vancouver goalie blocked the shot, and the puck ended up on Paul Cotter's stick.
Cotter didn't wait around. He went straight to the net and finished it.
No assist for the goalie, though. The helper that looked obvious to plenty of fans never showed up on the scoresheet.
One widely shared post asked what everyone was thinking: "Kevin Lankinen should get a primary assist for this goal, no?"
In the clip, the goalie stops the shot, the puck lands on Cotter, and he takes it straight to the net to finish the play.
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Manny Malhotra's Canucks catch the Oilers off guard in Edmonton
The bigger surprise was the start. The Canucks came out sharp in Edmonton, in a road opener few expected to tilt their way early.
This is the same organization that said it wouldn't talk about wins and losses until the foundation was in place. A fast start is a pretty good first brick.
Manny Malhotra, hired June 1, got the response a new coach wants. His players looked like they knew exactly what the assignment was.
Give the goalie the helper. When a save goes directly to a teammate's stick and ends up in the net, the guy who started it earned a point.
It's like writing the opening line of a speech and watching someone else's name get printed on the program.
The Oilers came in hot, with a four-game win streak and a loud welcome for Mike Babcock. Vancouver didn't seem to care much about the script.
These two meet again Thursday in Vancouver. Babcock gets a day to fix whatever went wrong early, and Lankinen might still be waiting on that assist.
Should Kevin Lankinen have been credited with an assist on Paul Cotter's goal?
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