Let’s not pull any punches: the Canucks were awful last season. They lost 51 games, the most in franchise history, missing the playoffs by 12 points. They had the worst goal differential in the entire league. Then, just like how the franchise began, they lost a draft lottery and missed out on a franchise-defining forward.
But that was last season. The Canucks have made some changes during the off-season and are certain that this coming season will be different from the last. They’re absolutely right: it will be much, much worse.
This 2016-17 season will be the worst in franchise history.
FORWARDS
The 2016-17 season was the worst offensive season in Canucks history. They managed just 191 goals, fewer by one than their anemic 1998-99 season. It’s hard to see how they could possibly be significantly improved this season.
The Canucks are still depending primarily on the Sedins and, while I’m sure you’re tired of hearing this, the Sedins are getting old. At 36, the Sedins are significantly older than other team’s first lines. Daniel had 64 points last season, while Henrik managed just 55. That’s falling perilously close to second line territory already, but the Canucks are still depending on them as their go-to offensive players.
Add in the threat of injury problems—remember when Henrik’s back was so bad he literally couldn’t sit on the bench?—and you can expect the Sedins production to slip even further.
To stave off this inevitable decline, the Canucks brought in Loui Eriksson, who has played with them on Team Sweden in the past. Is it likely to work? It’s doubtful: sure, last season Eriksson managed his first 30-goal season in 7 years, but that was with a well above-average shooting percentage while on a line with underrated playmaker David Krejci. Expecting him to repeat that season with the aging Sedins is foolish.
After the Sedins and Eriksson, the Canucks lines are composed entirely of question marks, which are, historically, terrible at playing hockey, seeing as they use absurdly curved sticks and hold them upside down over the puck.
Alex Burrows is well past his prime and Jannik Hansen is extremely unlikely to repeat his career-high 22 goals from last season. The Canucks are depending on unproven forwards like Sven Baertschi, Bo Horvat, and Anton Rodin to provide offence. Jake Virtanen, their golden forward prospect, is a shift or two from the AHL.
When you look at the offensive performance that other teams are getting out of their young stars, it’s laughable to think the Canucks will be able to compete. And if anyone gets injured, the Canucks' woeful depth will destroy them.
DEFENCE
The Canucks defence consists of Chris Tanev and that’s basically it. His partner on the top pairing, Alex Edler, is prone to catastrophic turnovers that are masked by Tanev’s competence.
Wunderkind Ben Hutton is due for a sophomore slump, particularly considering he’ll be paired with Erik Gudbranson, an analytics nightmare unable to move the puck up the ice. Gudbranson is exactly the type of defensive defencemen that the game is outgrowing.
Luca Sbisa is still on the team and, without Matt Bartkowski as a comparison, will reveal himself to be substantially the same player he was when the Canucks acquired him. His new defence partner, Philip Larsen, appears to be a lesser version of Yannick Weber.
That leaves the depth: Nikita Tryamkin is a raw behemoth that needs seasoning in the AHL, but will likely immediately bolt back to Russia if he ever gets sent down to Utica, while Alex Biega simply isn’t an NHL-caliber defencemen. If the Canucks are smart, they’ll keep Troy Stecher in Utica, far away from this tire fire.
Even Tanev, for all of his vaunted defensive prowess, provides nothing on the offensive side of the ice, which is where the Canucks were hurt the most last season. Their defencemen simply didn’t provide any offence, with Bartkowski tying with Edler for the team-lead in goals with six. That’s absolutely pathetic.
Meanwhile, one of the biggest losses on defence has been overlooked: Dan Hamhuis. His experience and steadying presence will be missed more than we realize on such a young defence corps.
GOALTENDING
The Canucks seem to think they’ve solved their goaltending situation, but have they? Assumed starter Ryan Miller is old and trending downward, sure to be massively exposed by the questionable defence in front of him.
Meanwhile, his assumed successor, Jacob Markstrom, is earning massive plaudits for simply being average last season. Are we letting one competent season erase the memory of how terrible he has been in his NHL career? His mental fragility means he’ll get eaten alive as the losses begin piling up.
The great hope for the Canucks crease, Thatcher Demko, is simply not ready. He needs at least one full season in the AHL, possibly two, before he can actually make inroads into the NHL. There’s no salvation coming there.
SPECIAL TEAMS
The Canucks had one of the worst power plays in the NHL last season. Their solution: a guy who couldn’t cut it with the Edmonton Oilers and left to play in the KHL, where he scored fewer points than Cam Barker. Yeah, that http://italics Cam Barker.
Philip Larsen simply isn’t the answer on the Canucks’ power play, which could actually be worse than last season. The next best option is Troy Stecher, a raw rookie out of the NCAA who they have rightly decided to keep in the AHL.
The penalty kill won’t be much better. While Tanev can hold his own, there’s little reason to believe any of the other Canucks’ defencemen will do anything shorthanded. Gudbranson and Sbisa might block a lot of shots, but mainly because the puck will hit them so often with all of the shots they give up when they’re on the ice.
In addition, the Canucks’ centres can’t win faceoffs, which will severely impact their effectiveness on both the power play and the penalty kill. You can expect a lot of chasing the puck from the Canucks’ special teams this season.
CONCLUSION
The expectations have been set incredibly low for the Canucks this season, but the Canucks will surely surpass those low expectations by going even lower. Expect franchise lows in goals, wins, and points, putting them in perfect position to lose the draft lottery next April.
