Over the next couple weeks, What to Expect This Season will go across Canada from West to East examining the Canadian teams in the NHL, detailing the organizational changes made during the offseason and forecasting what the coming season will bring.
We’re three weeks plus a day away from the opening of the 2015-16 NHL season, the one day of the year where every team still has a chance of winning the Stanley Cup. Of course, that number is cut in half in roughly three weeks once everyone sees how bad Carolina and Arizona and various other rebuilding teams are this season, but one Opening Night, everyone has a shot.
In anticipation of the puck dropping for the first time, I’m going to take a quick tour through the Canadian teams, looking at the moves they made and giving my two cents on the changes they made in the offseason and where I think they’ll reside at the end of the regular season.
First up, the Vancouver Canucks.
Outgoing: F Nick Bonino (Pittsburgh), F Zack Kassian (Montreal), F Shawn Matthias (Toronto), F Brad Richardson (Arizona), D Kevin Bieksa (Anaheim), D Adam Clendining (Pittsburgh), G Eddie Lack (Carolina)
Incoming: F Brandon Prust (Montreal), F Brandon Sutter (Pittsburgh), F Adam Cracknell (St. Louis), D Matt Bartkowski (Boston), G Richard Bachman
Prospects: F Sven Baertschi, F Brendan Gaunce, F Jared McCann, F Hunter Shinkaruk, F Jake Virtanen, D Jordan Subban
Vancouver general manager Jim Benning believes that as currently constructed, the Canucks are a 100-point team that will make the playoffs in the Western Conference, but I don’t see it.
The club crept over the 100-point mark last year, finishing with 101 points and the fifth seed in the conference and a first-round playoff exit. While they’re going to be younger and quicker this year, that doesn’t necessarily mean the Canucks are going to be able to hold steady where they were last season.
Looking at the club’s moves over the offseason, bringing in Prust for Kassian is a solid move, even though they’re landing the older player in that deal. Kassian was horribly inconsistent during his tenure in Vancouver, while you can be sure that Prust is going to give you grit and toughness on a nightly basis, plus some added leadership.
Dumping Bieksa, an aging veteran and one of the few remaining ties to the team that reached the Stanley Cup finals, on Anaheim for a pick is solid because as much as he’s a fan favourite, you can’t just hold on to guys because the people in the seats like him.
Adding Sutter, a capable two-way center in his mid-20s, is an improvement up the middle and he should be more effective and productive overall for this team than Bonino was last season.
All that being said, this team is likely going to be relying heavily on some young, relatively inexperienced players and I’m not sure they’re capable of living up to what is going to be asked of them this coming year.
I have no concerns about Bo Horvat – I think he’s a good, young piece for this club long-term and he’s already got a year under his belt, including four points in six games in the playoffs.
But Baertschi has failed to stick in parts of three seasons and he’s going to be counted on to fill a Top 6 forward role with this team. He’s only 22 and could still pan out, but there have been no indications that such a turnaround is coming. As much as prospects like Gaunce, McCann and Virtanen have upside, they each probably need another year or two of seasoning in the minors before they’re ready to be regular contributors at the NHL level.
That means that once again, the heavy lifting on the offensive side of things has to be done by the aging Sedin Twins, hoping that Radim Vrbata repeats last year’s 30-goal season and looking for improved output from guys like Alex Burrows and Chris Higgins.
The move that really surprised me was shipping goaltender Eddie Lack to Carolina for a draft pick, since Ryan Miller is another year older, was hurt for large portions of last season and wasn’t great when he did play last season. Lack was better – and significantly better than Jakob Markstrom, the new back-up – and getting no one that can contribute in the here and now in return was curious.
Looking at last season’s Western Conference standings and thinking about the moves that were made in the offseason, Vancouver will likely be in the hunt for one of the final two playoff spots simply because they’re strong defensively and a healthy Miller will keep them in games.
But I would expect Calgary and Colorado to take a step forward, Los Angeles to bounce back and Dallas to make a run at things as well. All of those teams have question marks as well, but they have less pinned to inexperienced players than the Canucks, so if I were a betting man, I would wager that this is going to be a frustrating season in Vancouver, one that ends with the team missing the playoffs.
