Canucks have a promising new pairing on blue-line
That’s what you get when you put Gudbranson and Hutton together
In a four-day training camp that included more than 20 hours of on-ice instruction, the most impressive 10 minutes may have been on Saturday afternoon when Vancouver Canucks assistant coach Doug Lidster ran the defencemen of Group A against one another in a skating competition.
The group’s blue-line was topped by the new pairing of Ben Hutton and Erik Gudbranson, the hulking defenceman acquired from Florida in May to give the Canucks size and toughness and provide some security for the highly skilled Hutton.
Two at a time, defencemen started at opposite faceoff circles, skated backwards from point to point across their circle, backwards to the blue-line, then pivoted and accelerated forward toward a lone puck in the high slot. First defenceman to the puck got a breakaway. The second defenceman felt shame.
Gudbranson, 6-foot-5 and 216 pounds, the tough “stay-athome” defenceman, went undefeated in the group. Three times he beat the fleet Hutton head to head.
“I saw that,” Hutton, 23, said sheepishly after practice. “Three times. One time I had a little bit of a stumble, but the other two I was thinking he must have been cheating or something. He was bugging me about that. Honestly, I think he’s a great skater for a guy that size.”
Apparently, Gudbranson may not always stay at home, although his primary focus with the puck will be transferring it to Hutton, who for four days here was encouraged by his new partner to, essentially, move his butt.
“It’s all about skating in today’s NHL,” Gudbranson, 24, explained. “You have to be able to move and stay square to the shooter. That comes from your body position, that comes from your hips and your edges. (Hutton’s) a good skater. I just got a couple of jumps on him.”
See what a good teammate Gudbranson will be?
From the day of the trade, May 25, when the Canucks surrendered 19-year-old centre Jared McCann to the Panthers in a package that included a secondround pick in June, Gudbranson has been intended for Hutton.
It just seemed like a sensible match — two young, Ottawa-area defencemen with complementary skill sets.
How does it seem after training camp? Even better.
“He’s my D partner; if anyone’s going to take a run at him, they’re going to have to deal with me,” Gudbranson said. “In that sense, yeah, totally I can help him. I want to get his feet moving and hit him in stride and get him up the ice with the puck as soon as possible. I think we’re going to be a good partnership. We’re both on the same page. We’re both excited to play with each other and grow as a unit.”
This is actually the second time they’ve played together.
At a Kingston Frontenacs junior training camp several years ago, they were paired for two days of practices and scrimmages.
“I was just a quiet, young guy and he was showing me the ropes,” Hutton said of his 48 hours in Kingston. “That was cool. That was just something that stuck in the back of my mind as soon as he got traded. Like: ‘Oh, yeah, I’ve played with him before. That’s sweet. Maybe he’ll remember me.’ ”
Gudbranson soon left Kingston for the National Hockey League as the Panthers’ thirdoverall draft pick in 2010. He was already starting his fifth season in Florida when Hutton, a fifthround Canuck pick in 2012, made the NHL last fall straight out of the University of Maine.
“I did remember playing a game with him,” Gudbranson said in Whistler. “I knew he was from down the street (in Ottawa). It’s kind of funny that we end up playing together.”
The Canucks will be elated if Hutton and Gudbranson are effective enough to stay together and play 20-22 minutes a night as the second pairing, which would ease the pressure on the top duo of Alex Edler and Chris Tanev.
Vancouver hasn’t had a big, topfour defenceman who will punish opponents in front of the net since Willie Mitchell was allowed to leave in 2010. Mitchell and another rugged former Canuck, Ed Jovanovski, tutored Gudbranson in Florida.
Gudbranson averaged a careerhigh 20:06 of ice time last year, even though he had been eclipsed in Florida by 2014 first-overall pick Aaron Ekblad. Hutton averaged 19:52 as a rookie, but was often the Canucks’ best defenceman. Opponents noticed this and targeted Hutton physically in the second half of the season, which at least partly drove the acquisition of Gudbranson.
“By the end of the season, they were coming a little bit harder at me,” Hutton said. “I do think they’re going to be a little more timid if they take a huge run at me knowing that Erik’s right beside me and he’s a big, tough lad.”
It was obvious in Whistler that Gudbranson can do much more than police opponents. Nobody gets chosen third overall in the NHL draft just because he’s tough.
“In Florida, he was being groomed to be a steady, toppairing guy,” Canuck goalie Ryan Miller said. “When Ekblad came in, that changed the dynamic. We’ve inherited a guy who’s building the foundation to be a top-pairing guy. Defencemen are similar to goaltenders in terms of developing and building a smart game. We’re catching him right in the middle of a pretty good uptick.”
“Everyone’s been talking about this,” Hutton said of the pairing. “But getting to actually skate with him, I’m excited for sure.”
Especially after finishing second.