Come For The Banter - Stay For The Disappointment
Nucks Fan Rebuild & Retool Center - Come For The Banter - Stay For The Disappointment
"Say, do you know what the secret of good comedy is?"
"No. What is the se-"
"Timing."
-Very old joke I still do when I'm drunk enough
When last we left our intrepid heroes, they were on a Holy Quest for We're Not Quite Sure What. Lists of names have emerged, rumours have abounded (if that's a word), and the Merry Band of Misfit Toys has packed up and gone home. Or off to the World Championships, as the case may be. And the fans are left to speculate.
Some very interesting names have cropped up, most of which we riffled through last week. But we're still not clear on what positions are being hired for. Could be that only one hire is made in this round, that being a general manager to go through their rolodex and think of the future. But maybe not.
On a guess, Adam Foote isn't long for the world of bench-bossing, at least not here. That Jim Rutherford has said he'd leave the decision to the general manager is a positive sign for us, the fans. Less so for Foote, the coach. But whether it was because his plans were bad or his communication of them was, his coaching simply didn't work. Sure, the team changed what the objective was halfway through the season, but I'm agreeing with Vern on this one.
But found GM or not, there is more to this white-collar hiring spree than meets the eye.
Rutherford hasn't said, but has certainly implied, that he doesn't really want the job for much longer than he's had it. Fair enough, given his age and years at the job. Heck, when he was first hired, he brought along the one who would have taken over by now if things had gone to plan. But this is Vancouver, and Vancouver feasts on hubris. Patrik Allvine is gone, and the job title of Once and Future Manager remains.
The most interesting name to crop up last week was probably Shane Doan. He has an excellent reputation among hockey folk, even if his Curriculum Vitae is a bit thin. He's mentioned a disinterest in being a general manager, per se, but the Canucks aren't only looking for a GM. They are also looking for who can take over for Rutherford himself, and relatively soon. He has a local-ish interest as part-owner of the Kamloops Blazers, his old WHL team.
Anyone the team gets as an Assistant to the President (or whatever title they go with) will have a year or two with Rutherford to get their feet wet. That seems like a better plan than someone assuming the title of general manager only to get promoted when Rutherford decides to retire. The president has a different role from the general manager, and keeping the two distinct from the start is the best idea. Doubly so if Rutherford plans to leave soon.
The big empty space is still the GM's role. While the draft is still some ways away - June 26th, to be exact - there is plenty to do between now and then. The draft lottery is on May 5th, but that's hardly a vital moment. The team doesn't need a general manager in place to watch lottery balls fall into place. But somewhere soon after would be good.
Unlike most teams, Vancouver has few restricted free agents coming up on July 1st. Pierre-Olivier Joseph is the only one on the playing roster, and his best role is as a veteran 7-8 defenceman. Good to have around, but not the most important signing of the day. Danilla Klimovich is coming due as well, and there's a decision to be made there, but probably not a huge one. You get the point.
On the other hand, the Canucks have several other players they need to make decisions on. The trade deadline may have passed, but trades can be made year-round. Even as teams are eliminated from the playoffs, the opportunity is there to ask them if, hey, maybe if you had one of our guys, you would have made it a wee bit further? Strike while the iron is still crying from a lack of home game revenue, as they always say.
So yes, while the team doesn't strictly need a general manager to be named before the draft lottery, having one in place wouldn't go amiss. At the very least, interested teams should know who to call.
Online writing is an interesting thing. The writing remains the same, while the medium - or at least the format - continually changes. Some of us have gone from Notepad cut and paste through Write or Die freeform gibberish over the decades. I have writing that ended up lost and gone forever because I don't have a program that can read it. No great loss, frankly, but it does make comparisons difficult.
If you look to the future, some version of it will be there, sitting in front of you to examine at your leisure. But it won't be an accurate version. Yes, this is about the Vancouver Canucks.
Needless to say, this season has not gone without a hitch. Lots of prognostications had Vancouver making the playoffs, and for good reason. Yes, Quinn Hughes was still on the team - and that helped - but mostly it was all about how weak the Pacific Division was. That part of the predictions still holds true, since in no sane world is Anaheim challenging for first. The playoffs, sure, but first place? Nah.
On paper, the team was easily comparable to others in the Pacific. But there is an important feature inherent with predictions: you can't predict injuries. The Canucks are a paper-thin team, talent-wise, but if they stayed reasonably healthy, they would likely be challenging for a spot right now. But that didn't happen. Hoo, doggies, that didn't happen.
They tumbled, plans changed. And no, nobody believes the team has "been in a rebuild for a couple of years already," Jim. No one. On the other hand, a certain amount of resignation coming from the management team is an oddly refreshing change. It's nice when they acknowledge reality along with the rest of us.
Instead, everyone sees that the team isn't going to hit ten wins at home. We all know the remaining games are going to be filled with mistakes and unequal events. We get it, we really do. Some will complain you're doing it wrong, whatever "it" is, but that's going to happen. This is a city of two million general managers, after all. No one here has a wingsuit they're going to magically pull from their backpack. This team is going downhill and is going to take their lumps doing it.
Then it's time to get up and plan the next route up the mountain.
Funny story: the Canucks' power play has been extremely productive since the team returned from the Olympic break. As in "around 30%" good. The penalty kill, on the other hand, remains bad. Not "worst in the league" bad, but a 75% success rate, which isn't great.
The overall goals stat isn't following the same plan. Just 51 for in 19 games is in the bottom third of the league territory, but not as bad as it could be. Scoring is probably the most forgiving stat for a young team, a place where mistakes aren't as visible as they might be otherwise. Young players are encouraged to "go try stuff" when standings aren't on the line. They were drafted for a reason, now go show it.
Their goals against, on the other hand, is brutal. The 85 given up in those same 19 games doesn't really have an equivalent. Even the Maple Leafs gave up seven fewer, and they have played one more game in that time. Not gonna lie, that one hurts. Now, the Canucks have allowed a team-record 24 empty netters this season, but you have to be behind before that's a risk. And they've been behind a LOT.
The Canucks have missed Derek Forbort as much as any other player this year. As much as we appreciate Pierre-Olivier Joseph, he was supposed to be the seventh man, not an option to keep Tom Willander company. There were games when Vancouver had four defencemen with fewer than 100 NHL games in the lineup. Yes, Kevin Lankinen and Nikita Tolopilo could have been better, but come on. There are plenty of games where opponents scored five or more and the goaltending wasn't the problem.
That makes next year's plan all the more interesting.
The newly-signed Victor Mancini is waiver-eligible next season. He hasn't been great, but he's been good enough that losing him is not only a real possibility, but would do damage. At just $1 million, there is plenty of reason to be patient. The team wants him to use his 6'3", 225 lbs frame more than he has, but that's never really been his game. But his offence hasn't been his NHL ticket, either, and he's going to be on a team with not much size. If he wants to stick, spending Summer taking an MMA course wouldn't hurt.
It's the other three that have the questions. Zeev Buium has the highest upside, but is also the youngest, almost a year younger than Tom Willander. Elias Pettersson the Defenceman has the least pressure to produce points, and is the most physically developed of the three. But his inexperience shows when he's trying to sort out his timing, especially in his end of the ice.
And never mind having a defenceman from this season's draft joining the team next year. Just no. Don't do that. Personally, I don't want to see any player from the 2026 draft on the team in the regular season. Let them avoid the pain of a full 84 games of one-win-in-four level hockey. We don't need them to be good next year in Vancouver. Let them be good right where they are.
Which brings us back to the Three Musketeers. There is, I think, a decent argument to be had for playing them in the AHL next year. Maybe one, maybe two, maybe all three. Next season is going to be hard on everyone, and there are going to be plenty of games where the Canucks are simply outmatched. The available free agents aren't great next year, but they will be veterans who can handle the workload physically and mentally.
On paper, this is a more talented team than the standings indicate. Odds are very good that they will improve considerably on this year's result. But in an ideal world, they will stay in that bottom-five position while individual players gain experience and improve their skills.
We don't know what the future looks like, but we can make educated guesses and act on those. Maybe if I had learned how to save things in different formats sooner, I'd have more of my work available. Maybe if the Canucks had anticipated Hughes leaving, they could have chosen not to rely on injury-prone players. But we are here now, and can always make plans for our future tense then.
The kids are going to play out the year, of course. It's a little unfair to Tolopilo and Lankinen, but them's the breaks. What will be more interesting is seeing what happens next.
Source: National Hockey League @ Elite Prospects
Following the Vancouver Canucks is a challenging thing just now. It doesn't help when marginally more successful teams are making changes either behind the bench or in the front office.
Yes, we're calling the Vegas Golden Knights a "marginally more successful team" than the Canucks. If you saw them play against Vancouver on Monday, you wouldn't be impressed, either. And they're 32 points up the standings.
There are nine games left before the regular season comes to a merciful end. We've mentioned - A LOT - about how to keep any kind of interest in our favourite team. Look for growth in the kids, see the veterans find their voices, maybe just focus on a player you like.
But, lordy, there is a lot you have to ignore. And that's getting harder.
The Canucks have lost six in a row, but that's not the important part. We all know losses are going to come through the end of the year. There is a talent imbalance, an experience deficit, and little motivation for success outside personal embarrassment. So, sure, losses happen.
The loss against Vegas mostly involved the chances given. Adin Hill stopped more than Kevin Lankinen, as a percentage, but it's hard to point to Lankinen's performance as the reason Vegas won. A recurring refrain from Canucks games has been "The pass to [player] coming in alone on net."
That Vancouver played well enough to possibly win is an indictment of the Pacific Division. The Golden Knights are in the playoffs by default, not through any effort of their own. They changed coaches the day before this game, for crying out loud. They're not doing great.
A losing team can still be fun. In fact, if you have watched two different teams sharing the division, you probably had fun doing it. The San Jose Sharks in the past two seasons have lost plenty of games, but they're also been fun to watch. They haven't always been able to hold it together, but when they did it was cause for celebration.
The last fun game the Canucks played was against the Anaheim Ducks, who also shouldn't be in the playoffs, but are in the Pacific Division, so... They also have a bit of a "defence optional" approach to the game. Fortunately for them, their offence has been catching up, and that's an easy way to sell tickets.
What can sell tickets in Vancouver while we wait? It's tough to tell, since we don't know what they're going to do next.
There have been vague implications of "big changes" from Jim Rutherford, and rumours that Patrik Allvin is going to take the fall. There are plenty of reasons for him to do so, of course. Possibly the biggest is every decision made leading into this season, and then being pushed aside for the biggest moment of this management's brief tenure. Rutherford stepping in for the Quinn Hughes trade was the dagger, and Allvin has been bleeding ever since.
One question is how much of the blame for the current disaster can be laid at Allvin's feet. In theory, the direction of any team is dictated by the general manager. In practice, much of that seems to be coming from Rutherford instead. That goes back to the decision to move Bo Horvat and keep J.T. Miller, a trade handled by Allvin, but likely made necessary by Rutherford's direction.
While that trade wasn't bad for the value returned, it and subsequent ones were guided by the "win now" direction. That core misunderstanding of the team is hard to forgive. Is it a a good thing that the tightrope the team chose to walk is now recognized as leading to a brick wall?
The current coach is here because the best defenceman the team has ever had wanted him to be. Adam Foote got a three-year contract out of that wish, though the "search" for a new coach was limited to two names. As a result, they will likely lose the other choice, Abbotsford bench boss Manny Malhotra. It's that or fire Foote and pay him to not coach. And we don't know how effective Malhotra will be in the NHL with what will be a very weak team.
To say Foote has been ineffective is an understatement. After nearly a full season, the players still look lost in their own end. Their control of the puck in the opposing end is minimal. And they seem unsure of themselves everywhere on the ice. For a team that is going young - they had four rookies on the defence at times this year - that's not a great sign. He can absolutely take his share of the blame.
But more has to be reserved for management. Rutherford said that they have known "for a while" that Quinn Hughes wasn't coming back to the team when his contract expired. Thing is, that "a while" was apparently mid-season in 2024-25. Every decision made from that point should have been pointed at a post-Hughes team. And it wasn't.
Everything from keeping Pius Suter past the deadline to re-signing Brock Boeser to hiring Foote was centered around the assumption that Hughes was staying. If they knew otherwise, none of that should have happened. The signings and trades (or lack of them) were bad enough, and that's on the general manager, but they were made to a purpose.
We all know where this is heading. This ship was less run aground by a storm and more by "get a blindfold and hold my beer". We aren't aboard the SS Minnow but the Exxon Valdes. They are going to lose some fans in a rebuild, but it'll be worse if they don't course-correct, and soon. And fair enough - tickets aren't cheap, and the entertainment value has been minimal lately.
There is something to be salvaged yet. The Canucks have started to rebuild their prospect pool. They have picked up younger, capable players. They seem less likely to trade away high draft picks, though the night is still young. All that is positive, though we're going to need to see that through the draft and into next season to check if it's a blip or a habit.
I'm not too worried about the effect of bad coaching on the young players this season because everyone is going to try to forget it. And yes, being unable to communicate your plan or failing to adjust it to the players available is bad coaching. It's not impossible that Foote can improve in the offseason, but seeing improvement before then would be more reassuring.
Leave the Canucks, though? Nah. They're my team, and I've been here longer than damn near anyone drawing a paycheque from them. I don't know if I've seen a worse season, certainly not one with a greater discrepancy between expectations and results.
But I am a very patient fan.
As Vern put it: Hwoof. I may be paraphrasing here, but not by much.
Our Long March continues through this long March, with the Canucks scoring just three wins since returning from the Olympic break. That's 3-7-2 in the past month, and 13 games to go before the season's end. If the dismal effort at home against the St. Louis Blues is any marker, the team's best move may have been changing the seat colours to make the empties harder to spot.
They weren't officially eliminated on Saturday night, but boy, it felt like it. Kevin Lankinen only faced 20 shots, which sounds like a good defensive effort until you see Jordan Binnington faced five fewer. Check the tape: are we sure these guys played sixty minutes?
Vancouver isn't just the worst team in the league by a huge margin, but they managed the feat in what is a shockingly bad division. So that's possibly a blessing in disguise: if the narrow beam they trod held up, they might have thought they were good. The top team might not have enough points to qualify for the playoffs if they went East.
A comment of mine from the Smythe Pacific Division preview, lo these many moons ago:
Vancouver has more top-end talent than enough of these teams to make the playoffs. But the game requires more than talent. The Canucks can have one or two things go wrong and still make it, so long as those things going wrong aren't one of three players.
Guess what? A whoooole lot more than "one or two things" went wrong, and they included all three of those players. The rest of the division has been as shaky as expected, but Vancouver sure didn't take advantage. Their farm club in Abbotsford has likewise been eliminated from playoff contention. That's a more dramatic fall from their championship season, but when things go wrong on the parent club, it shakes all the way down.
There is plenty of time to talk about offseason moves and team goals. The Draft Lottery is coming up on May 5th, already marked on many Canucks fans' calendars. We can console ourselves with dropping down to third for almost two months (June 26) before the draft itself.
We'll also have to figure out what to do with the folks who remain.
The season started with the stupidest plan going: Win for Quinn. I try to figure out what the team management is thinking before I write about them, and that usually forces me into an optimistic mindset. Not going to relitigate all the moves I've disagreed with here, but even for me this was frikkin' weird. If your decisions are being dictated by a player, then skip the middleman and give him the hat. You'll save money that way.
If they were pushing to keep him, there was one route: tell him we're rebuilding, and he's going to be the guy at the core. Yes, he'd be in his early 30s by the time the team was contending, but he'd be the stake the tent is erected around. Apparently, that wasn't the approach they took, and we ended up with this circus.
So, some of the players the team should keep are pretty obvious: the folks that came back in the Quinn Hughes deal, the young defencemen, Drew O'Connor... Some folks are going to remain simply because the demand for them isn't high. Getting a return for Brock Boeser could be a challenge right now, for instance, but his value could improve next season. Same story for pretty much all the veterans. Keep them and see if their value improves, or cut bait, take the loss, and move on if offered anything reasonable.
The trickier question is who will be running the rebuild.
Ownership has already decided to let the current management make one of the biggest deals in team history. But that was forced by the player - an exceptional situation that a changing of the guard wouldn't help. But the question of whether Jim Rutherford and Patrik Allvin are the right people for the job. Rebuilds weren't exactly the Pittsburgh Penguins modus operandi while Rutherford was there. He does have three Stanley Cup rings, two with the Penguins and Carolina's only victory. So it's not like he hasn't done the job.
The question is, what job is he doing?
Allvin is a bit of a wild card in this circumstance. Yes, he's the actual general manager of the Canucks by title, but Rutherford stepped in to manage Hughes' trade. If he wasn't trusted by the guy who hired him, then why should the owners? And why should we? In theory, he is here to replace Rutherford when he retires. It's a bit odd when a team only intermittently has a president. Is there an actual definition of duties between the two? Who knows?
The other question is whether coach Adam Foote survives until September. He was, the story goes, hired on Hughes' endorsement. Without Hughes, does he have a reason to remain in place? The Canucks lack talent, certainly, but is that the entire problem here?
I rather like the plan Foote has. He wants to make the defence an active part of the offence, apply pressure on puck carriers, and maintain a presence in the attacking zone. It, uh, hasn't worked. The style has a lot of each player reading the play and deciding in the moment what their best play is. While every player needs to make decisions, there are levels of freedom they have. The more familiar the players are with each other and their coaches, the more freedom they usually get.
The coaches obviously bring their own preferences with them. Rick Tocchet was far more strict in how much leeway the players had. Bruce Boudreau was somewhat more relaxed. Each of them had some success in Vancouver. Certainly, more than Foote's system has managed. The current version of the Canucks doesn't seem to be getting it, in any case. Management needs to decide whether the fault lies in the players not understanding their roles, the coach not communicating them, or the general manager not supplying the talent to perform them.
While that last isn't entirely on the players - a LOT has happened this season - they have to know they're playing for their jobs. The results they have on the ice might well mean they're playing for Adam Foote's as well. Vancouver does have an in-house replacement ready and waiting in Abbotsford, even with their disappointing results.
So what can be done to save, well, everyone? Not much, truth be told. A dozen games shouldn't change anyone's mind after watching the previous 70. But perhaps some grace will be given, considering the changing objectives. In October, the goal was to convince one player to stay. In December, it was to re-energize the team (and fans) after a disastrous start in a push for the playoffs.
Now, the objectives are quite different, depending on who's watching.
For coaches: see what the new arrivals are capable of; mix defensive pairs and forward lines to see whose skills complement each other; and discover which veteran players want to be here for a rebuild.
For management: decide which players are worth keeping for at least one more trade deadline; see if the coach can effectively communicate his system to the players; and see if that system is one that will interest fans, even in a brutal season coming up.
For the owner: trust the management knows what they are doing, or replace them. Outside of that, hands off.
For the fans: It's been years since the team has been deliberately bad, and the Aquilinis are just going to have to suck it up. We get to find out if they have the patience for a rebuild. It's the worst job of all the ones here - and the one we're stuck with. And it starts now.
Trade Deadline Day has come and gone - as have some players - and the Canucks are well into their latest home stand. Have any questions been answered? Do we have a clear direction? Is there at least one sign of what the management or ownership intends in the long term?
Kinda.
Going into the deadline, we all knew it wasn't going to be the One Weekend that Solved Everything. There was plenty of hope that the obvious moves would be made, plus one of the large contracts shuffled off. That was pretty much an ideal set for the workday.
That didn't happen, but they got a return for Lukas Reichel, which is a frikkin' miracle in itself. So they get a pass on this one. But what's coming up?
Goals would be nice. On-ice goals that home fans could cheer for. Yeah, it's going to be a little chaotic on the back end, so giving up more than we want to is going to happen. But losing 5-4 or 5-3 is a lot more fun than losing 4-1. Are there any signs of the Canucks getting to that point? With 16 games to go, half are at home. Give some entertainment to the folks who are finally able to afford tickets now that the scalpers are quitting the field!
The best thing going right now is that coach Adam Foote may have discovered a line that works.
A line of the finally healthy Marco Rossi centring Liam Öhgren and Brock Boeser has three goals in their last 24 minutes together with just one against. And more than that, they've been fun to watch. While there's a question of whether Boeser should still be with the team next season (he should), they should probably keep together what works. And this line looks like it works. I'd be perfectly happy to have this as the working second line going into next season. Reserving the right to change my mind in another ten games, of course.
On the blue line, Zeev Buium is coming along, too. It helps that he's getting time beside veteran Filip Hronek, but that's what you should do with talented rookies. He's using his speed, showing his creativity, and getting 20 minutes a night. Excellent! Over the past three games, that duo's possession metrics have been through the roof! In all of 23 and a half minutes together, sure, but that counts!
In goal, Nikita Tolopilo has been getting far more time than planned, and he's been...decent. I'm not going to sugarcoat his numbers; they've been rough. But he and Kevin Lankinen are playing behind three and sometimes four rookie defencemen out there. That can't be easy, especially given that Tolopilo is an NHL rookie himself. He still has a tendency to lose his posts, especially when play goes behind the net, but has plenty of skills worth waiting for.
We're going to give a hat-tip to new arrival Curtis Douglas, too. Adding a "nuclear option" to a young, light team that is going to be outmatched on plenty of nights is a relief. He knows what his job is out here, and he's going to get plenty of ice time to show us more. He's a Group 6 unrestricted free agent at the end of the season, so he's playing for a contract.
He's at the league minimum right now, and if he wants NHL ice time, he'll likely sign for that again. But if he shows that he can keep up to the pace, Vancouver probably has a two-year deal in the offering. There is no possible way that Evander Kane is returning, so he won't be interested in flexing his muscle between now and game 82. And while Marcus Pettersson is willing, he really isn't good at the gloves-off portion of the game.
The Canucks are going to be a bad team again next season, and they damn well should be trying to be one. But there is a cost to that, and it's in enduring loss after loss over 84 games.* But at least they have a safety valve on hand. Having someone like Douglas doesn't just stop teams from trying to win by roughing up the kids. His presence can also quell the temptation to run up scores to ridiculous levels, or to try alleviating the embarrassment of actually losing to the Canucks by gooning it up.
This homestand has been pretty mixed after three games. It should - in theory - get better for a simple reason: the team can practice.
There is a difference between the practice without opponents - what they had after the Olympic Break, for instance - and what they get between games. Without needing to travel, the new arrivals, medical ward escapees, and call-ups can get used to each other. With a team this bad, a lot of experiments can happen, and they can try them out the next day. That's good.
The bad news is that not many experiments work. The good news is that the pressure for them to do so is as low as it will ever be. Stick Öhgren in front of the net on the power play? Sure! Stick Rossi on the point with Buium? Why not? Have Tom Willander kill penalties? He'll have to sooner or later, so why not now?
Line combinations, special teams work, communicating with the goalies, breakout plays, all sorts of stuff can be experimented with. That's one argument that can be made.
On the other side, there's something to be said for simplifying everything. Go back to basics and see how the younger players perform. They'd probably get shredded the instant an opposing coach saw what they were doing, but at least everyone would be on the same page. And don't worry about rebuilding anyone's trade value this season. Sixteen games with the pressure off isn't changing anyone's mind.
As far as watching goes, well, it's not going to be pretty. We the Fans have the draft lottery to look forward to, followed eventually by the draft itself. Sure, there could be some action between the end of the season and Draft Day, but that's not for a while yet. Find a player you like, and see how they do. Check out what Foote does in what are possibly his last days as coach. Speculate whether ownership will clean house this offseason or next.
The Canucks season is essentially over, but there's entertainment to be had yet. You just have to look a little harder for it.
*Incredible timing for Vancouver to be the worst team in the league just as the season gets longer.
The Vancouver Canucks and Buffalo Sabres crossed swords last night. The Sabres weren't quite on their 10-game win streak, losing once before facing Vancouver, but were still riding high. The Canucks, on the other hand, hadn't been doing so well, with just one win in six games since a brief winning streak post-Quinn Hughes.
What happened next probably won't surprise you.
Vancouver was on the road, which, in theory, is a tougher game. But the Canucks have triple the wins on the road as at home, so "grain of salt" that thought. It still didn't go well for them, as the post-game column here can attest. They outshot the Sabres 35-20, but some of that is score effects and some poor shot choice. Or maybe it's frikkin' genies, as the Canucks are 3-11-2 when they outshoot their opponents* this season.
It was a fairly lethargic game from Vancouver through two periods. They had 14 shots in the first, sure, but only a few were dangerous. A short-handed goal against, and, well, it wasn't their night. Until approximately ten minutes into the third, when Buffalo took a double minor. The team found new life, getting to within one before an empty-netter finished them off for good.
And if that game was played at home, the fans would probably have gone home happy. Or if not happy, then happy-ish. Because that, ladies and gentlemen, is where we are.
Ask Team Canada at the World Juniors if they would rather have the Bronze medal or fourth place. It's a quick and easy reply to what should be an obvious question.
That being said, there is the matter of scale. A team in a tournament that happens once a year over the course of two weeks isn't the same as a team in an ongoing league. An Olympic or World team might plan a year ahead, maybe two, to consider the logistics. An ongoing team can change that to years.
Right now, the Vancouver Canucks have no plan. They had a plan, and one that involved a core of Elias Pettersson the Forward, J.T. Miller, Thatcher Demko, and, of course, Quinn Hughes. Anchors at all the important positions, and a coach who can bring them together with proper discipline and solid technique, Rick Tocchet. Add some reliable side pieces, like Brock Boeser, Kevin Lankinen, and Filip Hronek, and we're set to build a challenger!
Let's not go into details about how that went.
Suffice it to say, that plan didn't last. Three times, that plan didn't last, as Miller, Tocchet, and Hughes all fell away. Now they have a plane that didn't fly and are trying to decide what bits to sell off for parts.
The NHL does help the worst teams in the league by giving them the opportunity to select draft-age talent before the better teams. This controls where said talent goes and for how long, with a few notable exceptions. Teams are reluctant to trade their highest picks because, over the years, we've seen that it is far and away where most of the talent is available.
You want a star? Bad news, buddy, they're tough to find! You're probably going to have to draft one.
So, yes, in the NHL, losing can be a good thing. In fact, it could be said that losing is an essential part of being good. So, shouldn't the Canucks be one of the best teams in the league by now? After all, they have been quite a bad team for most of the past dozen years! Well, that's the thing: you have to PLAN for when you are going to be a bad team. If you are an accidentally bad team, and the plan you have is to be a good team, then you're walking around London with a Paris street map. Interesting, but mostly useless.
Right now, the Vancouver Canucks are in Surrey with a topographical map of the Moon. A fine idea, but it ain't helping.
Are... Are you a shareholder in the Vancouver Canucks? Seriously? Uh, h-hey! How you doin' there, Francesco? Uh, don't read any other part of this website, okay? Not for a bit, anyway. It's dull. Really. Mostly about flowers and stuff. We're talking about maps now, so... anyway. Good of you to drop by. Maybe we'll talk later, eh?
(Is he gone? That was crazy, guys! WTF, right!?!)
We, as fans, are just going to have to decide what it is we like about the team. If what you like is winning, well, that might not be for a good long while. Not consistently, anyway. Know, though, that a win can come on any given night, and it's pretty fun to be there when the home team scores an upset. Granted, that's not been a common thing this season, but it's still fun when it happens.
But that's not going to be the majority of nights. So you have to pick what you like from what is given us. Watching a young player like Tom Willander get through his growing pains to become a solid, middle-pair contributor is fun, even in losses. Heck, my favourite Canuck during the Sedin Era was Jannik Hansen. Those years got pretty frikkin' barren, but he was still a good watch.
Or pick a vet whose job has suddenly become guiding the kids as they come into the fold. There's always a risk of them getting traded away, but you can look for moments where they're giving advice on the bench or guiding traffic on the ice. And you never know how they'll react to a new world. The amount of ramping up Hronek has done since Hughes left is night and day. He was happy to be in a supporting role here, but he's loaded that defence onto his shoulders since becoming The Man on the blueline.
It's even fun watching the farm crew finding their way, like Linus Karlsson or Max Sasson, earning new deals. They aren't going to be stars, but becoming NHL regulars is already a huge task. Enjoy them for the work they put in. It doesn't always work out - I'm a big Jett Woo fan, and still waiting for his arrival. Might never come, but if it does, I'll be there for it. I'm a sucker for a throwback player, what can I say?
If you want to be really oblique, you can watch the coaching. See what styles they use in different configurations, consult a Jack Han manual or two. But if you thought watching your favourite veteran could be short-lived, the coach of a losing team has the lifespan of a mayfly. Watch it while you can. Remember: it's a game, and games are supposed to be fun. Find your joy in it now, and hope for a big payoff in the future.
Just not too far into the future, okay, Francisco?
*13-9-3 when they get outshot, just for the record.
The Vancouver Canucks are going to open the season at home against a tired Calgary Flames team. Not saying it's a "must win", but other teams' travel is one of the few advantages being coastally-based gives. So they better.
But in among the expectations for the coming season, something is always going to surprise. What is it that will make fans and players alike blink twice at the stats pages by the time all the hardware is handed out? I pestered a couple of my bitter rivals coworkers for answers.
Yeah, I'm gaming it because I'm the one writing it up. I'll put them in what I think is least to most shocking if it happens. We're not going to bother with the impossible - "Fans convince the Aquilinis to sell!" - but any of these would be a surprise.
Did I mention I cheated? Because I asked his opinion last week, well before the mini-clinic Braeden Cootes and Jonathan Lekkerimäki put on against Edmonton. The kids showed they belonged, even if one's 18 years old, and even if it's briefly.
The magic of ten games is that's when his entry level contract burns a year, so is looked on as a hard line for NHL teams. I don't know how important that is anymore, though. A bigger line to me is when he's no longer considered a rookie going into next year, a 25-game limit.
The other barrier to his being sent down is that he can't go to the AHL, but would have to return to the Seattle Thunderbirds in the WHL. That's a huge jump, so even if it's close the Canucks might be reluctant to send him back. It's worth talking about.
Off the deep end quick, then. This season is going to be an interesting watch for a lot of reasons, not least of which is whatever system rookie coach Adam Foote puts in place. He consulted - a LOT - with his players over the Summer, and that had to include asking them what they wanted to see.
It looks like they're pressing for offence, led by the blue line. Not a bad decision, given where the talent lies, but it's risky. Demko and Lankinen are good at breakaways, but there's only so many a team wants to give up. If it doesn't work quickly, Foote might change his mind back to a tight, controlled game.
For the record, Vancouver had no wins with a 5-goal gap last year.
This one's going to be really tough. It means either the second wild card was handed a gimmie at around 90 points compared to Vancouver's 100-ish, or that the Canucks finished the year with 105+. Not impossible, but the weaker teams in the West have stocked up a bit, and we probably won't see the level of underperformance that we did last season.
The obvious choice here is Elias Pettersson returning to form. No one else on the team is really "that kind of guy" to suddenly produce at a triple-digit pace. If Foote's system works as intended, then more players will have a chance at more points, but that'll be spread out.
If Pettersson makes it to 100 points, then everything is going perfectly. Things can still go just fine and he'll finish the year at 80-85 instead, and that's far more likely.
Okay, this is more in the "boy, I hope not" category than the "what a shock" one. It's a condensed schedule with an Olympic break, and we all know what Thatcher Demko's injury history is. If he's playing this much, it means Lankinen has been injured, Nikita Tolopilo tanked, and the race is close in February. Oof.
I'm going way out of the box with this one, but mostly because I want more people to notice Kirill Kudryavtsev. He is... disturbingly stable out there, and not just on his skates.
Have you ever heard of the 2003 movie The Cooler? William H. Macy plays a guy who is employed by a casino because whenever he's at a table, whoever else is there has a streak of bad luck. He doesn't win, but that's not why he gets a salary. He makes sure other people lose.
That's Kudryavtsev. When he's on the ice, nothing happens. Shots for, shots against, chances anywhere just dry up. It's kind of hilarious, but also a really underrated skill, especially for a sub-six-footer.
Now, for him to come to Vancouver, a lot of dominos would have to fall. With Jett Woo and Guillaume Brisebois both out long-term, Abbotsford need a stable top pair. That's probably going to be Tom Willander and recently-recalled Victor Mancini.
For Kudryavtsev to get the call, they have to need a stable player, not the swashbuckling style of those two. I'm anticipating a trade from Vancouver's blue line fairly early in the year, moving him up in the depth chart. And once he's here, I think the coaching staff will want him to stay.
So, what do you think? Too wild? Not wild enough? Let us know!
I hate this. I mistrust productive preseasons and don't care for kids being dropped into the NHL in their draft years. Vancouver's previous first-round draft picks likely won't make the team this year. This year's pick just happened to be exactly what the Canucks need, positionally speaking, which brings the Devil's Candy to mind. Desperation makes it easy to overlook flaws.
So what's going on with Braeden Cootes?
Braeden Cootes has earned his spot; let's not pretend otherwise, here. He's had some protected time on the ice in his three games so far, which is reasonable for an 18-year-old. But you can't protect a player when you're on the road and have few other options. It was a typical pre-season road game with just a few NHL veterans as the home team dressed two of the best in the world.
His line in Edmonton was with Kiefer Sherwood and Drew O'Connor. If you saw that during the season, it would be a fourth line. Here, it was their second most frequent combination. Cootes himself pulled almost 17 minutes in the 3-4 loss, a two-minute increase over his previous two games. The key may be why other players haven't managed to stick: he's not playing scared.
His second goal of the preseason was a lucky bounce off a defender, but his first was a lucky bounce off him. Is that better or worse? Answer: they all count. Cootes is getting wither the puck or himself into the right spots to score, and that's not even his best feature. Seeing him step right up to angle Leon Draisaitl away from the net, or going to the boards to fight for the puck is a delight.
It's not completely fair to use a first-round pick as a comparison to players who were drafted much later, or even not at all. But where Cootes is now is so much farther along than where Danila Klimovich or Nils Åman or Arshdeep Bains were in their first training camps. He isn't bothering to think about not making mistakes because he's doing what he needs to do.
That AHL championship win has helped so many of Vancouver's prospects, no doubt. There is a lot of pressure coming up the ranks right now, and that's fantastic to see. The confidence that Bains, Linus Karlsson, and Max Sasson played with last game is what they needed. Any of them could start with the NHL club this season, with Bains probably having an edge there.
Cootes didn't need that. His Seattle Thunderbirds have not been good, with several veterans graduating in his second year. That's the same year he was named captain of the team as a 17-year-old. That in itself speaks volumes about what he's bringing alongside his skills. His skill set gives him a subtle advantage over, say, Jonathan Lekkerimäki. He's ten pounds heavier, and what he does with it matters.
Braeden Cootes has been put on a simple regimen. Play well enough in this game, get to play in the next one. That's fine for the preseason and all, but when the season starts, the consequences of not being able to keep up are far higher. The pressure that Vancouver has put upon itself to not just make the playoffs this year but to "show promise" for the future is through the roof.
Can they afford to have a player who hasn't played a single professional game on the team? It's a tougher call than you might think.
On one hand, there is a lot of depth in that bottom six right now. The Canucks have loads of players who can fill those spaces, many of whom have NHL experience. It could easily be argued that they are better than Cootes right now - or will be better by season's start. But will they be better in two or three months?
As we've said before, Cootes can start on a fourth line. He has appropriate skills for the position. If the team wants him to ba a "two-way player" then there's little harm in it. He'll not only play against the best in the world, he'll also practice with them and be coached by them. Even if he only plays ten or twelve minutes a night, everything around him being at this level is still there.
Now, the tough part is accepting that if he is used this way, he might only get 20 points or so in his first year. In this season, that just might be how he helps the team the most. If he has low point totals _and_ he's a healthy scratch, they can still send him down to Seattle at any time. This ain't a mysterious yellow wood, here. We can switch trails whenever we want.
On the other hand, Cootes is looked upon as the leader of a rebuilding Thunderbirds squad. He could absolutely gain experience as The Man relied on to score every night. In the WHL he'll be relied on to do everything for his team, including being a physical presence. He could get twice the ice time in Seattle that he would in Vancouver.
But if he did that, it would be against WHL players on a WHL team. His top priority wouldn't be learning how to angle Leon Draisaitl away from the net, that's for sure. It would be to rack up points for a team that's probably going to have difficulty scoring, and let the rest sort itself.
This is why sports is the ultimate Reality TV. Any plan the team comes up with might work, but we're not going to know until it resolves.
"We need to convince Hughes to stay with Vancouver!" Yeah, okay. I'll do this quickly.
As amazing as his vision, his skating, and his passing are, Quinn Hughes' single best feature is his brain. He thinks the game incredibly well, which is what was so disturbing last season. Watching him realize the best play he had was shooting from the point because of his disfunctional forwards was just ugly.
The best way to keep Quinn Hughes in Vancouver is not treating him like an idiot.
Want to make a trade to improve the team this season? He's perfectly aware of what you're giving up to do it. Losing draft picks is one thing; losing players, another. If you're bringing in a UFA at the expense of a potential future scorer, you better be ready to re-sign him. And they had better contribute. Don't rush a bad deal and think he'll be happy about it.
The Vancouver Canucks are finally back in action against an opponent SUNDAY! SUNDAY! SUNDAY! The first of six pre-season games will kick off in Seattle at 5:00 p.m. in Climate Pledge Arena. We don't know who will be tapped for the game, but there are some things to watch out for.
The vibe coming out of training camp has been full-bore optimism. Pretty standard boilerplate for any pro sports squad, though. Even players on teams that know they are in tough will praise the new faces/signed veterans and "plans for the future" and all that. That's not the case here. The team has sounded more relaxed, oddly enough.
A lot of this is coloured with Retr-O-Spect Glasses(tm), but this group that missed the playoffs sounds more confident than last year's bunch, who were coming back from the third-highest point total in Canucks history. They sound ready.
The biggest difference between now and a year ago is probably health. Thatcher Demko's knee, Dakota Joshua's cancer, and whatever was going on in the dressing room had everyone on edge. None of that is around the arena this year.
As is typical with these pre-season games, only some of the established veterans will play tomorrow. With that in mind, here's a quick look at what we're looking for.
Demko says he is completely healthy and looking forward to the season. And, with the extra time put in, he's figured out how to best work around his popliteus injury. There was a lot of second-guessing how to best protect his knee while still being effective as the season went on last year. That resulted in the worst numbers of his career. That's not going to happen again.
He and Lankinen are obviously sharing the workload this season, but then who? Jiří Patera's injuries last season also kept him off the ice, and he didn't show up in Saturday's scrimmage. Patera has NHL experience and was signed with the intention of being the Canucks' third goaltender behind Demko and Arturs Silovs. That... didn't work.
But now he finds himself in third place behind Nikita Tolopilo and Ty Young in Abbotsford. Young played in Kalamazoo before joining Abbotsford as an injury replacement, and he showed well enough that the team wants him moved up a level. Sure, keeping Patera in the system would be great insurance, but he won't be happy about life in the ECHL.
Quinn Hughes can switch onto frikkin' cruise control for another two weeks. He's ready to go. But we want to give the young guys a chance beside actual NHL veterans. We know who the top four are going to be, so it's up to the rest of the set to sort themselves out. Pierre-Olivier Joseph is the barrier any of the kids need to clear if they want to start in the NHL, and he's not making it easy for them.
Joseph has looked really good in scrimmages, adding pressure onto even Elias Pettersson to prove himself. As good a skater as Tom Willander is, he hasn't been up to speed against this level of competition yet. And that's not including the startling Kiril Kudryavtsev, who I didn't expect to get this far, never mind doing it in three years. Victor Mancini is also likely ahead of Willander at this point, and that's fine. A year - or even a few months - in the AHL won't do him any harm.
But it's going to be very interesting to see who gets that 6/7 spot. Derek Forbort was a penalty-killing anchor on last year's squad, so whoever pairs with him will probably need those chops, too.
We'll have to see who is sent to Seattle and who will kick off their season in Abbotsford. There will be enough veterans to keep things interesting, and on a guess, Coach Foote will want his top lines to be the lines he wants to start the regular season with. Wherever Brock Boeser goes, he'll probably have Elias Pettersson and Jake DeBrusk with him. Likewise, Filip Chytil, Evander Kane, and - surprise, surprise! - Jonathan Lekkerimäki.
The other nine forwards will probably be a mixed bag of veterans and rookies or new arrivals. The point isn't really to win these games but to see who can work where in Vancouver's system, either full-time or as a call-up. So far, two players have really stood out in a pleasant way.
Filip Chytil looks angry. He knows his reputation as being injury-prone and not good at protecting himself from hits. It's not great to say, but given the nature of concussions, that's going to haunt him until he has an extended period completely healthy. But man, when you see him going at full speed, you can see why he really can be the answer to Vancouver's missing 2C. They can really use his puck-carrying ability.
Speaking of things I don't want to say, the other player is Braden Cootes. I am loath to put any more pressure on a rookie who JUST HAPPENS to be a right-handed centre with a high hockey-IQ and leadership tendencies, but he's not looked out of place. And he, unlike Lekkerimäki, could start his career getting ten to twelve minutes a night on the fourth line and still be contributing. Yes, I am thinking of Bo Horvat when I watch Braden Cootes. Dammit.
Don't get me wrong, here. I'm looking forward to seeing him regularly with Vancouver. But he's 18 years old. And he's exactly what the Canucks need right now - if he happened to be two or three years further along in his development. Patience is a virtue, but so is building a team Quinn Hughes wants to stay with. Dammit.
There are six (ugh) pre-season games on the menu this season, and no doubt we're going to read way too much into all of them. So let's get to it.
The Vancouver Canucks have a lot riding on this season, but when haven't they? There is a unique aspect to a yo-yo team, expected to get good results but stumbling instead. Improving by 26 points, then falling by 19 the next season, is one hell of an impact. It leaves psychic damage. That kind of thing makes a fan want to curl up with a book and a bottle and stare at the fireplace instead of cheer.
Screw that! The season's kicking off October 9th, pre-season literally next Sunday. Find a feed, subscribe to a network, switch on the radio and LET'S GO!
After a year of compounding disasters, things just have to get better, right? Sure. Probably. A disturbing amount of this game is luck-dependent, and teams mitigate against it as best they can. Using the resources you have in the best way possible, preparing but not over-preparing, and managing workloads and workouts. All that's part of it, split between the players, coaches, and management.
That all being said, for all we know, fans clutching their lucky charms and lighting incense at their Trevor Linden shrine might make all the difference. But what should they ask for? We're here to help! In descending order of likelihood, five distinct wishes for the 2025-26 season.
Vancouver's (Eleven-point-)Six Million Dollar Man* is back in town. There is a lot of concern about how his scoring didn't just drop, but plummet. Sure, injuries played their part, but his goal scoring and his point production were half his career average. And they weren't all that great through the last quarter of 2023-24, either.
It's not like he abandoned the team, though. He was still defensively responsible, with him, Brock Boeser, and Jake DeBrusk putting up a modest expected goals against per 60 minutes. But that isn't really what Elias Pettersson is on the team for, is it? He was on the ice, and his numbers were fine for a second-line centre - touch of irony there. But Vancouver needs more.
They'll get it, too. Yes, there are plenty of jokes about him putting on 6 kg because he got married. I did much the same, with a far less modest 15 kg in one year. Did you know that when you get married, sometimes your spouse likes having food around? Like, ALL THE TIME and not just once a week? Weird.
Anyway, the odds of Pettersson suddenly turning fat are zero. Zip. None. He's going to be 27 years old this season, and he was embarrassed by last year's results. He has something to prove, and I, for one, would be uninterested in standing in his way. I think his drop in play was mental. Again, some injury bumps and bruises are part of the game, but that doesn't explain the lack of aggression that killed his numbers.
I think his mind is in the right place now, and it will show early and often. The trick is finding who will work best with him.
Odds: 9/10
The last time Evander Kane was in his contract season, he scored 22 goals and 49 points in 56 games. The time before, he impressed San Jose with nine goals and 14 points in just 17 games, to go with 25 minutes in penalties. Before that? His second contract was signed on the back of a 30-goal, 57-point season. The other years are a bit of a mixed bag.
He is well-known for antics not only on the ice but in the dressing room. That's not great. Bringing in a player famous for discipline problems is an odd choice for a high-stakes season. But his lack of headlines in recent years has eased some of those fears. Troubles off the ice include assault accusations from sexual partners, a very complicated relationship with his former wife, and a gambling addiction while with the Sharks.
These all seem to be in the past now, as his time in Edmonton was relatively calm. Clearly, Canucks management is hoping that streak continues with his hometown team. And, of course, he has another end-of-contract season. He doesn't need to hit 50 goals or anything, but 25 with his usual truculence on the ice and a lack of drama off it would be a win.
Uh, no one tell him I said this, okay?
Odds: 8/10
The odds of this one coming true are improved just because there are so dang many of them. There aren't a huge number of spaces available to the promotable rank-and-file, but there are some. There still may be a trade or a free agent signing between now and training camp, but if not? It's not unreasonable to say there are two or three spaces among the forwards and one regular spot on the defence.
Since we last looked at the offence, Dakota Joshua was moved to the Toronto Maple Leafs. That opened up a space on the wing, where Vancouver has a decent amount of talent. They want talent down the centre, but right now we'll take what we can get. I don't think we're too far off in pencilling in Aatu Räty at 3C and leaving Teddy Blueger behind him to anchor the fourth.
If Räty is one young gun, Nils Åman, Linus Karlsson, Arshdeep Bains, and Max Sasson are looking to make their mark, too. Each of these guys has advantages, but they're young-ish, not young. For a young guy up front, it's Jonathan Lekkerimaki. However, he's not a player to start on the fourth line to work his way up. If he's not in the top six, then let him cook in the minors a bit longer.
The defence, on the other hand, has options. We can confidently pencil Elias Pettersson in to start the year. Beyond him, Tom Willander has made it clear he wants to be in the NHL now, not later. That's going to be a tough call, and if he makes it, it'll more likely be as a mid-season replacement. He's had a good showing in Boston and internationally, but didn't really build on the previous year.
But there's also (more than one young prospect! Amazing!) Victor Mancini. Mancini showed well in his NHL tryout last year, split between the Rangers and Vancouver. He's got very good size, though he's not much of a hitter. He skates well enough to get his mass into position and get the puck up when he has it. Like Willander, he will probably start in the AHL with expectations of dominance, possibly lining up with Jett Woo in the top pair.
If two of these guys can break through as solid, contributing regulars on the squad, then the team gets all that much deeper.
Odds: 7/10
Okay, yes, we're going to mention injuries a few times in this list. For good reason, too: the team's most important players each missed a dozen games or more. Thatcher Demko has played more than 50 games in a season twice and was brilliant in both of them. The rest of the time? He didn't play 50 games because he couldn't play 50 games.
In an ideal world, one in which GM Patrik Allvin has signed the team on to, Demko splits his time with Kevin Lankinen. Lankinen doesn't get overworked and let any sloppiness get into his game; Demko doesn't overstress any of his, well, anything. Lankinen is a perfectly good 1B, though a better heavy-use backup.
There are a couple guys in Abbotsford who should be able to step in if needed between Nikita Tolopilo and Jiri Patera. Ty Young might get a look or two, but if so, it better be because he's blowing people's doors off in Abby.
Bottom line is that when Demko is on his game, he's a top-five goaltender. That would be real nice to have available come the playoffs.
Odds: 6/10
Okay, hear me out. I know the team was second last in the entire league last year for shots on net. Their 24.5 per game was still one full shot more than the Chicago Blackhawks managed, and they finished... Ah, right. Let's not use them as an example.
Unlike the Blackhawks, the Canucks were also very good at limiting shots against last season, finishing seventh in the league. That level of discipline isn't likely to vanish, especially with the transition from Rick Tocchet to Adam Foote behind the bench. Foote played his entire NHL career as a defensive specialist and was responsible for the defence under Tocchet.
That being said...
He has the talent here to push the game up. No offence to Derek Forbort or Pierre-Olivier Joseph, but there's no offence to Derek Forbort or Pierre-Olivier Joseph. But the top two pairs on this club are more than capable of trying for mid-ice stops, catching opponents in the neutral zone. All four are strong skaters, and it could be worth the defensive risk for more offensive chances.
Heck, if either Mancini or Willander do play well enough to make the team, that can give the Canucks a pleasant surprise in the third pair. Getting the puck out of your end is one thing. Stopping it from getting there in the first place is another. But that's also asking a rookie coach to take a chance in a very high-pressure season.
Odds: 3/10
Right, now let's drop the dang puck! But let me grab my bottle first, just in case I need to celebrate.
*Whose bionic abilities include being able to run in boot heels. Man, the '70s were weird.
