You can see evidence for this as one of the first things Russia did was reopen those canals so water started flowing to Crimea again.
That might not have been the only goal, but it was certainly one of the bigger reasons for the attack.
The war in Ukraine is only a war of resources in very minor ways. It is much more about egos, nationalism and the idea that Russia deserves to be an empire.
That wasn't a war though, nobody called it a war between Ukraine and Russia at the time. Read news from the time, no mention of war between Ukraine and Russia.
The Ukraine war was very different than Russia other aggressions, the resource scarcity likely triggered this extra aggressive behavior. You can say this resource scarcity was ultimately their fault, but a starving beast will fight very aggressively regardless whose fault it is that its starving.
If the Crimean water crisis didn't happen then likely Russia would just have continued to incite rebellions and annex territory that way, and not declare a full scale war.
https://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/19/world/europe/ukraine.html
>The Russo-Ukrainian War began in February 2014. Following Ukraine's Revolution of Dignity, Russia occupied and annexed Crimea from Ukraine. It then supported Russian paramilitaries who began a war in the eastern Donbas region... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russo-Ukrainian_War
It not being in US news doesn't mean it didn't happen.
Russians tried to occupy Ukraine and destroy Ukrainian culture and identity for centuries. That is the real goal.
The war was inevitable. Here is from 2014: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-28229785