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<\/p>\nHis best save of the night came late in the second period. With the Canucks trailing 1-0, he stopped Flames defenceman Zayne Parekh on a Calgary 3-on-1 breakaway.<\/p>\n
\t<\/p>\n
\u201cHe did a fantastic job,\u201d said Malhotra. \u201cHe looked really poised and calm in net. When a goalie plays calm like that, it bleeds into the play of the 5-on-5 in front of him.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe made some huge stops. That (3-on-1) could change the momentum of the game. He did a fantastic job coming in for his first game and make the stops he needed to make.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Canucks trailed 1-0 after the first period but then battled back with four goals in the third to register their second win of the season.<\/p>\n
Liam Ohgren celebrated his 100th NHL game by scoring one goal and assisting on defenceman Elias Pettersson\u2019s winner as Vancouver improved to 2-1-0.<\/p>\n
Drew O\u2019Connor and Aatu Raty, into an empty net, also scored for Vancouver. Tom Willander and centre Linus Karlsson each had two assists.<\/p>\n
Matt Coronato, on the power play, scored for the Flames (0-2-0). Devin Cooley made 23 saves.<\/p>\n
The Senators drafted Merilainen in the third round, 71st overall, in 2020.<\/p>\n
In 2024-25, he played 12 NHL games, managing a 8-3-1 record, 1.99 goals-against average .925 save percentage and three shutouts.<\/p>\n
In 20 games last season, he was 8-10-1, had a 3.51 GAA and .860 save percentage.<\/p>\n
With other goaltenders in the system, Ottawa decided Merilainen was expendable, resulting in him coming to Vancouver.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen it happened it was a little weird,\u201d Merilainen said about moving across the country. \u201cBeing like four years with one organization, and all of a sudden you come over here and have a fresh start. For sure it\u2019s exciting.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a new opportunity, knowing it\u2019s a team that wants me here.\u201d<\/p>\n
Merilainen did make a brief appearance in Vancouver\u2019s 9-7 loss to Edmonton on Thursday night, replacing Kevin Lankinen midway through the second period. He allowed one goal on 11 shots.<\/p>\n
Merilainen said having that taste of action made him hungry for the main course of starting a game.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was pretty confident,\u201d he said. \u201cThe Oilers game went OK, and I had a good summer.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was a physical game with Calgary forward Adam Klapa fighting Canuck defenceman Luke Schenn less than three minutes into the first period. O\u2019Connor\u2019s third-period goal was set up after Vancouver centre Elias Pettersson delivered a huge hit on Parekh, freeing up the puck.<\/p>\n
\u201cI love that,\u201d Merilainen said. \u201cI love a physical game. It\u2019s more entertaining for me to watch.\u201d<\/p>\n
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 4, 2026.<\/p>\n
Jim Morris, The Canadian Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"His best save of the night came late in the second period. With the Canucks trailing 1-0, he…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":920292,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194298],"tags":[49,48,55],"class_list":["post-920291","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-vancouver","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-vancouver"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/920291","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=920291"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/920291\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/920292"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=920291"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=920291"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=920291"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}