from Iain MacIntyre of Sportsnet,

The Canucks, for all their talk about the National Hockey League playoff race and promising to be better on Wednesday than were in Tuesday’s slow-start victory over the dreadful Arizona Coyotes, were exposed and embarrassed by the Islanders.

The New York team that was within one win of advancing to the Stanley Cup Final last season overwhelmed Canucks starter Jaroslav Halak, pumping in five goals in the first 17 minutes before absorbing a lot of pressure from the Canucks in a 6-3 victory at Rogers Arena.

The game started a couple of hours after Sportsnet insider Elliotte Friedman reported that U.S. hockey legend Cammi Granato would become the third assistant general manager hired since Jim Rutherford became Canucks president on Dec. 10.

It’s another step in the regime change in Vancouver. But building a team is harder than building a management group.

Coach Bruce Boudreau, hired just before Rutherford, called Tuesday’s scoreless first period against the Coyotes the poorest he has seen from the Canucks.

“Evidently, I was wrong last night,” Boudreau told reporters late Wednesday. “You give up five goals in a period, I mean, there's not too many good things to say. It's crazy but they looked twice as fast as we did in the first period. I thought in the second period, we looked a lot faster than them. We've just got to be ready to play. I can't explain it any better than that.”

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Game highlights are below.