Canucks make the playoffs? ‘Go figure’ their chances are back to barely

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The Vancouver Canucks’ chances of making the Stanley Cup Playoffs were always running along the narrowest of ledges.

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And now, with five games to play, we can truly see how every point matters.

Two weeks ago, their chances were nearly down to zero, according to HockeyViz.com. (A month ago they’d been hovering around 30 per cent.)

Then they won six games in a row and had dragged their chances back up to about 15 per cent.

But dropping a single point to the Ottawa Senators Tuesday night has their chances back down to single digits.

Going into Wednesday action — the Canucks are idle, but two teams they’re in the playoff conversation with, the Vegas Golden Knights and Dallas Stars, are playing — the Canucks’ chances stand at about eight per cent.

That single point lost to the Senators now means the Canucks can’t get more than 97 points, an impressive total but possibly not enough to get them into the playoffs. If they do win all five of their remaining games, beginning Thursday in Minnesota, they have an 89-per-cent chance of making the playoffs.

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Before the Senators’ loss, 97 points would have given them a 93-per-cent chance of making the big dance. Even finishing with 96 points would have given them a 79-per-cent chance at the playoffs, but that’s now down to a 64-per-cent chance.

There’s just less margin for error. Had they won, they still could have finished with 98 points.

Even to finish with 96 points, the Canucks would need to come away with four wins and a loss in overtime or a shootout, a pretty hot finish to the season.

When we look at the remaining schedules for the Canucks, Golden Knights, Stars and Los Angeles Kings — the four teams that will finish either in the third spot in the Pacific Division or the final wild-card spot in the Western Conference — we can see why the numbers are stacked against the Canucks.

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It may come down to tie-breakers. Teams tied on points are ranked, in order, by regulation wins, then regulation plus overtime wins, then total wins, then points earned in games between the two teams.

The Canucks and Golden Knights both have five games left to play and are tied with 87 points, but Vegas has two more regulation wins than Vancouver and three more total wins. The Knights, who host the Washington Capitals Wednesday night, finish the season on a tricky three-game road trip in Dallas, Chicago and St. Louis, so even though the Canucks play in Minnesota on Thursday and Calgary on Saturday, Vegas’s conclusion to its season is a little tougher. There’s a decent chance the Canucks could squeeze ahead.

But LA, third in the Pacific, and Dallas, in the second wild-card spot, still hold more cards.

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NEXT GAME

thursday

Vancouver Canucks at Minnesota Wild

5 p.m. PT, Xcel Energy Center. TV: Sportnet Pacific. Radio: Sportsnet 650.

If the Canucks manage to win all five remaining games they’ll have 36 regulation wins, same as Los Angeles, which has just four games to play but has one more regulation win to date. LA has an additional overtime win, so the Kings are two ROWs up on the Canucks at this point.

The Kings have 92 points at the moment. If they win three of their last four, they’d get to 98 points and clinch a playoff spot no matter what Vegas or Vancouver do.

If they win just two games and the Canucks (or Vegas) win only four of their remaining five games, LA are still in, even on “just” 96 points.

LA’s last game of the season is vs. Vancouver on Apr. 28. That game is the Canucks’ penultimate game on the schedule, as they finish up in Edmonton on Apr. 29.

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For the Canucks to catch Dallas, the Stars would really have to limp down the final stretch. Starting Wednesday in Edmonton, they have six games left, one more than Vancouver. They’re in Calgary on Thursday, a pretty difficult back to back, but then they play their final four games of the season at home, against Seattle, Vegas, Arizona and Anaheim.

The Stars already have 91 points, so three wins in this six-game stretch will get them to 97 points, and if the Canucks do run the table over their remaining five games they’ll be tied with Dallas.

If that were to happen, this is one area where the Canucks could very likely have an advantage: Prior to Wednesday night’s action, the Canucks had two more regulation wins than the Stars.

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The Canucks have won themselves into the playoffs before, sometimes in crazy fashion, and if they are going to make the big dance this year it’s pretty clear that the path will never have been more haphazard.

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