Canucks are playing less skilled as a team compared to last season, last season they controlled play, maintained possession, played keep away from the other team, moved the puck quickly and accurately, seem to have lost that high skill puck control element in their game a bit.
To me, there are 3 central issues with the team right now relative to what was succeeding last year :
1) Goaltending. We win the first game with Demko. We might get a result out of the other two games with Demko.
2) Pettersson. The second line has just been an absolute black hole down the stretch and through the playoffs last year and has continued to start this year, and that rests entirely with the utterly dire play of #40.
3) 3rd defense pairing. With everyone healthy last year, we didn't have a weak defensive pairing and weren't vulnerable to line matching. This year we are, and the 1-0 goal last night as an example was a direct result of having Kucherov/Point/Guentzel out against the hapless Juulsen.
(2) and (3) both play into having less puck control, as you're referring to.
If we sprinkle in 2 extra Demko saves, a couple ES goals from the Pettersson line, and remove one 3rd pairing GA ... we're probably 2-0-1 or something. But when you have multiple issues with the team and each of them is costing you a goal every couple games ... those take points away and turn wins into OTLs and OTLs into losses.