Recap: Ducks Erase Another Multi-Goal Deficit, Fall 3-2 on Fan App Night

The Ducks overcame a two-goal deficit for the third straight game but could not find the decisive marker in the third period tonight, falling 3-2 to the Vancouver Canucks at Honda Center.
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The loss pushed Anaheim's winless skid to a season-long 12 games and dropped the club to 23-46-12 on the year. The Ducks will conclude the 2022-23 regular season Thursday on home ice against the rival Kings.
Mason McTavish and Drew Helleson scored for Anaheim, with Helleson's goal marking the first of his NHL career. Trevor Zegras tallied two assists for his 15th multi-point performance of the season. Lukas Dostal made 33 saves in the setback.

Rookie defenseman Jackson LaCombe made his NHL debut for Anaheim. Paired with veteran Kevin Shattenkirk, LaCombe registered three blocked shots and one hit in 18:24 of ice time.

J.T. Miller, Brock Boeser and Andrei Kuzmenko scored for the Canucks, who won their third of the last four games and improved to 37-37-7 on the season. Thatcher Demko earned the win in net, turning aside 33-of-35 shots, including a few spectacular saves in the third to preserve Vancouver's lead.
The first period was all about power-play goals, with all three tallies coming on the man advantage as the Canucks led 2-1 at intermission.
Boeser put Vancouver ahead first as the finisher on a tic-tac-toe passing play, with Miller and Elias Pettersson teaming up with cross-seam passes to give Boeser a slam dunk on the backdoor.
With the primary assist, Petterson became the sixth Canuck in franchise history with 100 points in a single season. The Canucks are the only NHL franchise with each of their first six 100-point scorers born outside of North America.
Pettersson has points in four of his last five games (2-2=4). He totaled 2-8=10 points in four matchups against Anaheim this season.
Boeser's goal was the 139th of his NHL career and his first against the Ducks since Mar. 2017, his second NHL goal.
With two points on the night, Miller clinched his second career 80-point campaign.
The Canucks doubled the lead on their very next power play about four minutes later, this time off the rush. Kuzmenko snuck behind the Anaheim defense while his teammates retrieved the puck from Vancouver's defensive zone, taking a stretch pass from Akito Hirose and beating Dostal on the subsequent breakaway.
While he is ineligible for the Calder Trophy, Kuzmenko's 39 goals tops all NHL first-year players. Recently signed to a two-year extension, the Yakutsk, Russia native scored five goals against Anaheim this season.
Demko grabbed an assist by setting the puck up for Hirose, the fourth helper of his NHL career.
Anaheim would get back in it before the end of the first period on their lone man advantage of the frame, with a power-play goal that looked quite familiar to those that came before it this season. The Ducks worked the puck around the perimeter of the zone, with Fowler eventually sliding a one-timer feed to McTavish in the right circle, where he crushed a slap shot past a sliding Demko to the near side.

McTavish co-leads NHL rookies in power-play goals (seven). He also ranks third in power-play points and total points, and fifth in goals and assists.
The assist was Fowler's career-best 37th of the year, and his fourth in the last five games. The 13th-year Duck, the only defenseman in franchise history with 400 career points in an Anaheim sweater, again paces Ducks blueliners in goals, assists and points this season.
Like Fowler, Zegras has helpers in four of his last five games. His 42 on the season are the most by a Duck since Ryan Getzlaf's 2017-18 campaign, the captain's final 50-assist year in the NHL.
Helleson tied the game late in the second period with the night's first even-strength goal and the first of his NHL career. The rookie defenseman, playing in his second NHL game, took a pass from Terry at the point and elected to fire his shot at the net through traffic. Demko appeared phased by the bodies in front, as the netminder's delayed reaction allowed the shot to ring the far side post and bounce in for the tying goal.

Recalled from AHL San Diego on Sunday, Helleson became the third Duck to score his first NHL goal this season, joining Nikita Nesterenko and Pavol Regenda.
The assist was the 100th of Terry's NHL career and extended his point streak to five games.
Vancouver would go right back ahead early in the third though, as Miller got to the front of the net and shoveled home a rebound after Phillip Di Giueseppe unloaded a slapper from the right circle.
Miller's goal marked the 200th of his NHL career.
Anaheim would push for the tying goal throughout a tight third period, but Demko simply shut the door from that point forward. The SoCal-born netminder did his best work on Jakob Silfverberg in tight, making back-to-back rebound stops on the veteran forward to all but seal the Canucks' 3-2 victory.
The Ducks will conclude the 2022-23 season Thursday against the LA Kings at Honda Center.