Canucks vs. Ducks: Lekkerimaki's Late Double, Hronek's OT Winner Snap Vancouver's 10-Game Skid

With 7:37 left in regulation on Tuesday night, the Vancouver Canucks were down 5-2 in Anaheim, riding a 10-game losing streak and looking thoroughly cooked. Then the night went completely off the rails, in the best possible way for Vancouver.

Jamie Oleksiak scored 31 seconds after the Ducks went up three. Jonathan Lekkerimaki scored twice in 49 seconds with his own goalie pulled to force overtime. And Filip Hronek blasted home a 5-on-3 power-play goal with 11 seconds left in the extra period, giving Vancouver a 6-5 win at Honda Center and its first victory since early October.

Anaheim Builds a Wall, Brick by Weird Brick

Nothing about the first 40 minutes suggested a comeback was coming, and some of Anaheim's goals were downright strange. A.J. Greer got credit for the opener at 15:52 of the first when his attempted pass to Tim Washe went off Hronek's stick blade and into the Vancouver net, per NHL.com. Remember that detail. It matters later.

Vancouver drew even at 6:36 of the second on a goal that was just as fluky: Liam Ohgren tried to center the puck for Zeev Buium and it bounced off Tristan Luneau's skate and in. The tie lasted 30 seconds. Jackson LaCombe gathered a long rebound in the right circle and fed Jeff Malott in front for a tip-in at 7:06.

Then Elias Pettersson took cross-checking and roughing minors at 15:16, and Beckett Sennecke deflected a Cutter Gauthier shot on the ensuing power play at 15:44. At 18:24 Leo Carlsson shoved a loose puck across the goal line after another long rebound, and Anaheim took a 4-1 lead into the third.

The Ducks Blink, Then Collapse

Brock Boeser pulled one back at 11:40 of the third on a bizarre one: Alex Killorn tried to swat the puck away from his own net and it hit Boeser in the chest and went in. Anaheim answered 43 seconds later when Greer tipped a Sam Colangelo point shot for his second of the night. 5-2. That should have been the ballgame.

It was not. Just 31 seconds later, Oleksiak hammered a slap shot from above the hash marks to make it 5-3. Malott and Paul Cotter were both handed misconducts at 10:36 of the third, a sign of how chippy things had gotten even before the collapse.

The Turning Point: Forty-Nine Seconds of Lekkerimaki

With Leevi Merilainen pulled for an extra attacker, Lekkerimaki scored unassisted at 17:14 to cut it to 5-4. Then, at 18:03, he wired a shot through a screen from above the left circle to tie it, with Pettersson and Hronek assisting.

"He's elite in terms of his ability to get it off and pick corners," Canucks coach Manny Malhotra said of Lekkerimaki.

Ducks coach Joel Quenneville saw the momentum swing in real time. "You get a goal like that and all of a sudden, you get a little buzz," he said. "But, we still had a chance to stabilize the game. We made a couple of funky plays there, an icing, a turnover, and very disappointing."

Overtime got messy for Anaheim fast. Sennecke went off for high-sticking Lekkerimaki at 2:49, and Killorn was called for goaltender interference on Merilainen at 4:33, putting the Ducks down two men. Hronek ended it at 4:49 with a slap shot, assisted by Boeser and Lekkerimaki. The guy whose stick produced Anaheim's first goal scored Vancouver's last one. Poetry.

The Comeback Crew

Lekkerimaki finished with two goals and an assist in 19:55, giving him six goals this season. Hronek logged a massive 27:08, scored his first goal of the season and added an assist. Boeser had a goal and two assists, Pettersson had two assists in 24:57, and Oleksiak's goal was his second. Merilainen stopped 18 of 23 shots and got the win anyway.

Anaheim had real bright spots in a brutal loss. Greer scored twice. LaCombe had three assists in 28:47 of ice time. Carlsson's goal was the 65th of his NHL career, passing Lucas Raymond for the second-most goals by a Swedish player before age 22, according to NHL.com, with Mats Sundin leading at 83. Sennecke has now scored in four straight home games and has 30 NHL goals in 94 games, the fourth-fastest pace to that mark in franchise history behind Paul Kariya, Bobby Ryan and Dustin Penner. Lukas Dostal made 27 saves.

Numbers That Explain the Chaos

• 4. Consecutive goals by Vancouver to end the game, per the AP.
• 1-for-7. Vancouver's power play was ugly most of the night, and then it won the game.
• 33-23. The Canucks outshot Anaheim despite trailing most of the game.
• 63.2 percent. Anaheim dominated the faceoff dot, 36-21, and Pettersson went 8-17. It did not save the Ducks.
• 9-2-0. Vancouver's record in its past 11 games against Anaheim, per NHL.com.

What It Means

Vancouver moves to 3-10-1 with seven points and 2-5-1 on the road. The Canucks had gone 0-9-1 during the streak, and Malhotra knew what the skid had been doing to the group. "When you string together as many losses as we have, it bleeds into the room and the morale takes a hit," he said. "Not just getting a win, but a big come-from-behind win in the third (period), is obviously something we can build off of."

"I'm hoping this turns a corner for us," Boeser added.

Anaheim drops to 5-6-1 with 11 points and 1-3-1 at home, and has lost six of seven. The tone afterward was harsh. "That can't happen," captain Mikael Granlund said. "It's unacceptable and we've got to do a better job closing out these games."

Quenneville did not hold back either. "That was a terrible loss," he said. "We carelessly make plays senselessly."

Groundhog Day, Finally Over

For 10 straight games, Vancouver woke up in its own version of Groundhog Day: same alarm, same song, same result. On Tuesday, down three with under eight minutes to play, the Canucks finally broke the loop. It took four goals in a row and a two-man advantage in overtime, but the alarm clock is playing a different tune now.

Stats from the official box score via ESPN. Postgame quotes as reported by NHL.com; additional details from the Associated Press.