That, and the rest of the roster not being near good enough outside of our handful of high end players. It's still the exact same problem this season.
The sad fact is that goaltending
did kill the Canucks last season. Once Demko went down, the Canucks were left with the AHL tandem of Martin and Delia.
Playing behind that Canuck defense, they were dead meat. Who knows how the season would have turned out if Demko hadn't gone down and recovered his form? The Canucks ended up 13 points out of a playoff sport, so at the very least they'd have been a lot closer.
Now with Demko back in form and DeSmith giving the Canucks solid backup minutes, goaltending has gone from being the team's Achilles Heel to one of its strengths.
And we're about to find out how important goaltending is in the kind of game that usually spells doom for the Canucks--the final game of a tough five-game road-trip against a quality opponent in the Preds.