J.T. Miller had a career-high five assists and Vasily Podkolzin collected two goals and an assist as the host Vancouver Canucks cruised to their fifth straight victory, 7-1 over the Arizona Coyotes on Thursday night.

Miller became the fifth player in Vancouver history to amass at least five assists in a game and the first since Markus Naslund did it against the Atlanta Thrashers on Feb. 25, 2003. The team record of six assists was set by Patrik Sundstrom on Feb. 29, 1984, against the Pittsburgh Penguins.

Alex Chiasson also scored two goals and Sheldon Dries, Elias Pettersson and Conor Garland each scored once for Vancouver (37-28-10, 84 points), which closed within four points of the idle Los Angeles Kings for third place in the Pacific Division.

Vancouver's Quinn Hughes added three assists, the 10th three-plus-assist game of his career, and Thatcher Demko made 21 saves.

Andrew Ladd scored for Arizona (22-47-5, 49 points), which lost its fifth straight game, having allowed at least five goals in each of those contests. Karel Vejmelka stopped 16 of 22 shots before being replaced at the start of the third period by Harri Sateri, who made four saves.

Vancouver took a 2-0 lead in the first period thanks to a pair of redirect goals. Chiasson got the first at the 10:18 mark when he deflected Miller's shot from the right doorstep. Dries followed with a power-play goal with a minute left in the period when he redirected Brad Hunt's point shot for his first goal of the season.

Pettersson extended the leaded to 3-0 with another power-play goal at 4:29 of the second period. He one-timed a Hughes pass from the right circle inside the near post for his 27th goal of the season.

Ladd cut the deficit to 3-1 with a power-play goal midway through the middle period. He slammed in a rebound of a Phil Kessel shot for his first goal since Jan. 22 and seventh of the season.

Five minutes later, Vancouver broke the game open with two goals in the span of 14 seconds. Podkolzin connected for a power-play tally when he cut in front of the crease and beat Vejmelka with a backhand shot. Garland followed with his 16th goal of the season on a wrist shot from the left circle at 15:39.

Podkolzin made it 6-1 with his 13th goal of the season with 27 seconds left in the second period.

Chiasson one-timed a Miller crossing pass from the left circle for his 12th goal of the season midway through the third period to end the scoring.

--Field Level Media