Canucks want to bring Game 7 urgency to Game 6

Whether or not the Vancouver Canucks’ collective mental state resembles a viscous goo at this point, they have landed on a psychological mantra they hope will end this series sooner than later.

Forget what the ticket stubs say Sunday. It’s Game 7 against the Chicago Blackhawks.

“It puts us in the same frame of mind as the other guys,” Canucks goalie Roberto Luongo said after practice Saturday. “Obviously there was maybe a little bit of a comfort level at 3-0, but there’s no more room for mistakes now. We want to make sure we’re playing as desperate as the other side (Sunday).”

Obviously, the Canucks still have one more mulligan, as a loss in Game 6 at the United Center merely brings the series back to Canada for a deciding contest.

But if the Hawks have achieved a mental edge with consecutive blowout wins, the Canucks feel it’s because they allowed that to occur. And thus they maintain their confidence is not on tilt.

“If we would’ve put our A game on the ice, maybe,” captain Henrik Sedin said. “But we haven’t been close to our B game. It hasn’t been good enough. It’s one of those things where you’re up 3-0 and you know you’re going to get more chances. (Sunday) is like a Game 7 for us. We have to go out and be focused and play like we know we can.”

Said defenseman Dan Hamhuis: “Maybe in Game 4, Game 5, we were thinking if we don’t win this one, we might win the next one. That has to stop for us. We have to focus on Game 6 and that’s it.”

The history between the two clubs suggests that it won’t be that easy. And even Canucks coach Alain Vigneault is finished with promising how his club will perform.

“One of the things that’s expected of me right now is to be very supportive, very confident, which I’ve been all year long with this group,” Vigneault said. “But at the end of the day, our actions on the ice have to speak for ourselves.

“We all know what we need to do and how to do it. I could stand up here in front of everybody and say I’m real confident that we’re going to get it done -- which I am. But the actions on the ice, that’s the most important talking.”

bchamilton@tribune.com

Twitter @ChiTribHamilton