The Vancouver Warriors’ offence is a work in progress.
Vancouver went 4-for-8 on the power play in their National Lacrosse League season opener Saturday night against the Colorado Mammoth, but they only managed three goals at even strength en route to a 10-7 loss before an announced crowd of 9,219 at Rogers Arena.
Vancouver has been pegged as one of the teams to beat in the NLL this season. They were major players in free agency, bringing Jesse King and Curtis Dickson, who both had 100 points for the Calgary Roughnecks last season.
There were just too many times Saturday that Colorado netminder Dillon Ward had his feet set and was square to the shooter for Vancouver to be successful. They needed to make him work harder.
Credit the Mammoth defence, tutored by one of the game’s all-time great checkers in coach Pat Coyle, for a chunk of that. They get in shooting lanes. They’re feisty and physical. And, as a team, they stymied the Vancouver transition grand spearheaded by the long-bomb passing wizardry of goalie Christian Del Bianco by continually hustling on and off the floor.
In the end, though, the Vancouver offence needs to be better. And it will be. There’s too much talent in the group to not be. It wouldn’t be surprising if Saturday’s seven goals winds up their season low this year.
“We don’t want to make excuses and say it’s a chemistry issue. We’ve all been playing lacrosse for a long time,” Dickson said afterward. “It’s something we’ve got to figure out pretty quick here.
“I think sometimes with a defence and a goalie like that they tend to pack it in a bit, and we were a little tentative shooting the ball.
“I think we just have to trust ourselves a little bit more and not get too cute and shoot the ball.”
As good as Vancouver was on the power play, they took themselves off four man advantages early by taking penalties of their own.
Vancouver also had issues on the face-offs without regular draw man Alec Stathakis (knee injury). He’s expected to be sidelined well into the New Year.
Vancouver was just 4-of-20 on draws, using Dickson, Reece Callies and Owen Grant.
Vancouver was involved in 441 face-offs last season. Stathakis took 440 of them. Grant was 1-for-1 in the lone other try.
Vancouver forward Ryan Martel (undisclosed injury), who was sidelined Saturday, has taken face-offs in the past. He’s expected back soon. Malawsky could call on him. He could end up bringing in someone else, too. The Warriors have a bye next week, and are home Dec. 13 to the Las Vegas Desert Dogs.
“I’m going to try to address it internally but if I can’t then I need to go external. I don’t want to (do that). I love our guys,” Malawsky said.
Ward finished with 37 saves for Colorado. Del Bianco made 36 stops for Vancouver.
New Westminster product Will Malcom tallied six times for the Mammoth. The backbreaker for Vancouver was his sixth, which came 22 seconds after Keegan Bal had cut the Colorado lead to 8-7 at 7:45 of the fourth quarter.
Malcom scored three times as part of a five-goal Colorado run in the third quarter that turned a 4-3 Vancouver lead into a 8-4 Colorado margin.
Malcom, 25, had 35 goals and 81 points for Colorado last season, marking his third straight season with at least 35 goals and his fourth straight campaign with 80 points or more.
Colorado’s won five straight games against Vancouver, dating back to March 2023. They’re 11-3 against the Warriors dating back to 2019. Saturday is the lone meeting this season between Vancouver and Colorado.
Bal had one goal and six assists for Vancouver. King recorded one goal and three helpers. Dickson and Adam Charalambides both had two goals and one assist.
Dickson, 37, is now up to 579 goals for his NLL career. Only three players in NLL history — John Tavares (815), John Grant, Jr. (668) and Paul Gait (635) — have broken 600. Buffalo Bandits forward Ryan Benesch, 40, leads active players with 581.
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