Article content continued

The current Canucks are also 27th ranked at even strength with 2.53 goals per outing and that only makes the power play problems more severe.

Photo by Gerry Kahrmann / PNG

However, even though Henrik Sedin doesn’t have a power play point, he was quick to point out Monday that this power play is not last year’s power play.

He believes the addition of Loui Eriksson to his unit — and two more traditional three forward, two defenceman alignments — Bo Horvat between Brock Boeser and Sven Baertschi and Markus Granlund between Thomas Vanek and Sam Gagner — are reasons for optimism. And past symmetry with Eriksson should help.

“Teams are so good now killing, you can’t guess out there,” said the Canucks captain. “You have to know where to put pucks and get the second chances and even after scrambles, knowing where to put pucks. That’s been our biggest problem.

“We’ve had games where we’ve scored and last year it felt like we would never score on the power play. We have three units and enough guys and it feels better than the last two years.”

As the Canucks prepared to face the Los Angeles Kings on Tuesday — and their ridiculous top-rated 91.9 per cent penalty kill — the only way to salvage this four-game trip with a .500 record was to either stick with what hasn’t worked the last half dozen games or get creative.

Newell Brown was brought back into the coaching fold to help rekindle the glory days. He was the architect of the No. 1 ranked power play in 2011 (24.3 per cent efficiency) and No. 4 in 2012 (19.8 per cent), but the league has either caught up to Brown and his varied formations or the Canucks simply don’t have the personnel to execute.