After their summer harvest of key, new players, the Vancouver Canucks were going to be better. But after the pre-season, the question remains: Will they be good enough?
The NHL playoffs are still 82 games away, and the eight exhibition games in 11 days that the Canucks finished this week merely reinforced uncertainty about how good Vancouver actually will be in the franchise’s 50th year. The team went 4-4, scoring and allowing plenty of goals.
As general manager Jim Benning and coach Travis Green pick their team this weekend, the Canucks have four days to prepare for their season-opener next Wednesday in Edmonton. And we’ve got a few takeaways from training camp.
PETEY 2.0
All those Pavel Bure references regarding Elias Pettersson made more sense in June when the 20-year-old Swede became the first Canuck to win the Calder Trophy since 1992. It sure doesn’t look like there’s a sophomore slump coming.
After leading the team in scoring at the end of last season, Pettersson led them on the opening day of training camp – he skated several teammates into the ice during Day 1’s timed intervals – and looked every bit the superstar-in-the-making during the pre-season.
Despite feeling “tired” in his first two appearances after Green’s difficult camp, Pettersson had three goals and three assists in four pre-season games.
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Although the Canucks are guarding his weight like a nuclear launch code, the centre is clearly thicker and stronger than he was as a 176-pound (so the game program said) rookie. He even looks taller than last season’s six-foot-two. Pettersson said he also feels quicker and “more balanced” compared to his rookie year, too.
His attitude is evolving with his body. He has been accommodating and patient with reporters, spent time with fans and generally conducted himself like a leader who is embracing all the challenges coming his way.
“I know the expectations are higher for me, but I’m the one who puts the highest expectations for myself,” Pettersson told Sportsnet. “I don’t think (about) what other people want to see from me. I try to play my best hockey every day.”
He may fail, but Pettersson looks ready to take on the world.
ADAM’S EVE
If you held a contest before training camp to name the player most likely to upstage Pettersson, no one would have won. Because no one would have picked Adam Gaudette.
A solid prospect who led U.S. college hockey in scoring while winning the Hobey Baker trophy in 2018, Gaudette often looked over his head in the NHL last season when Canucks injuries forced a premature promotion from the minors. The Boston area centre had five goals and 12 points in 56 games and was overmatched in the defensive zone.
All he did during the pre-season was lead the Canucks with four goals in six games, gaining confidence as he went, and outplay everyone else competing for a job at the bottom of the lineup. That still probably won’t be enough for Gaudette to be on the NHL team because the Canucks have roster and salary-cap limits to navigate and the 22-year-old is among the few forwards who can be sent to the AHL without waivers.
Gaudette will also develop better at the embryonic stage of his pro career playing first-line minutes for the Utica Comets rather than fourth-line minutes in Vancouver. What Gaudette did was instill hope that the Canucks may actually have another wave of players to follow Pettersson, Brock Boeser and Quinn Hughes into the NHL.
“He had a great camp,” Green said after the Canucks closed their pre-season at .500 by losing back-to-back home games against the Ottawa Senators and Arizona Coyotes, who won’t exactly be playing for the Stanley Cup in June. “He’s made it hard on us (to make a roster decision). Quite honestly, I wish other players made it harder on us as well.”
What really works against Gaudette staying with the Canucks is his position. Right now, he is strictly a centre. And there’s little chance Green is moving Brandon Sutter or Jay Beagle from the middle of the bottom two lines to make room for him.
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ANYONE WANT TO MAKE THIS TEAM?
Part of the reason Gaudette stood out is that most others competing for a depth spot at forward were largely invisible.
Jake Virtanen scored twice in his first pre-season game, but had a negligible impact in his final five auditions. Nikolay Goldobin played his way off the team with one assist in five games, and nobody except Green seemed to notice veterans Loui Eriksson and Tim Schaller, whose $7.9-million in combined salary last season bought 14 goals for the Canucks.
With skilled winger Sven Baertschi also running hot and cold after missing most of last season with a concussion, the Canucks don’t look like they’re going to meet the coach’s stated goal of having three lines that can score.
TOP END TALENT
Even if the bottom six disappoints, the Canucks should get a lot more offence from their top six as newcomers J.T. Miller and Micheal Ferland, who was restricted to just two games due to a virus, both looked good in the pre-season.
Miller is a winger clone of his two-way centre, Bo Horvat, and Ferland should get 20 goals if he continues to play with Pettersson.
And what looked better than either of the top two lines was the power play, which went 4-for-7 in a 5-3 win Monday against Ottawa. That new first unit – Pettersson and Boeser on the wings, Alex Edler (or Quinn Hughes) on the point, with Miller in front of the net and Josh Leivo in the bumper role – was probably the most encouraging part of the Canucks’ pre-season.
• The most discouraging moment was when Boeser left that first Ottawa game with a concussion after being shoved into the boards from behind by Senator Chris Tierney. Sorry to be Captain Obvious here, but the Canucks need Boeser back. Hockey-ops is hopeful the winger, who missed the opening weekend of camp before signing a three-year, $17.6-million contract, will be ready for the opener. If he’s not, the Canucks play only four games in the first two weeks of the season, so a short-term absence may not be too harmful.
• While Green experimented with forward combinations, the defence pairs were consistent: Alex Edler with Tyler Myers, Hughes with Chris Tanev, and Jordie Benn with Troy Stecher. These pairings have appeal. But there is still a big drop off to spares Oscar Fantenberg, currently injured, and Alex Biega. So, once again, the Canucks will be undermined by serious injuries on the back end if they occur.
• We’re just going to go ahead and say it: if often-injured Edler and Tanev can play 70 games apiece this season, the Canucks can make the playoffs.
• Tyler Myers, the big (literally and figuratively) free-agent acquisition, looked like the Myers the Winnipeg Jets had. His mobility and puck-movement were good, and his shot on the point is a weapon the Canucks have not had the last eight years. But he also looked vulnerable at times in the defensive zone, especially against shifty forwards. Myers will help the Canucks more than he hurts them, but there is a danger in Green asking too much of him.
• He may not get top-six minutes like he did last season after his trade from Toronto, but Leivo is a handy player who’s going to help. He had four points in five games and led Vancouver with 16 shots during the pre-season.
• Sutter is a huge wild card for this team. He scored 17 goals and 34 points in his only healthy campaign as a Canuck, but has missed 139 games during his other three years in Vancouver. If he gets 15 goals and is strong enough to handle the defensive heavy-lifting Green requires of him, the Canucks will have their third line.
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