THE FIVE BIG QUESTIONS
Canucks veterans will have to improve, young guns will need to step up
Jake Virtanen is in and so is Brock Boeser.
The pair made the NHL team after the Vancouver Canucks set their opening night roster Tuesday, assigning Darren Archibald to the Utica Comets.
The regular season opens Saturday, and what follows are of the five biggest questions facing the team’s forwards:
1. Who should play with the Sedins?
Daniel Sedin was noticeably exasperated by this question. To be honest, so was I.
For nearly two decades it’s been asked.
Who fits best with the Sedins? “We’ve talked about this for 17 years now,” Daniel said.
It’s never been a life and death question. But it’s mostly felt that way. For much of the millennium, the issue has been tied like a constrictor knot to the Canucks’ successes and failures. As the Sedins go, so go the Canucks.
Yeah, those days are winding down. This should probably be the last October the subject is even necessary.
It has seemed for a while that Vancouver had collectively decided Markus Granlund is the next man up heading into Saturday’s opener. New head coach Travis Green apparently has other plans.
“I think they want (Granlund) as a centreman this year,” Daniel revealed.
Green admitted later that’s exactly what he wants, though he acknowledged it could change.
Well, this changes things. Truth is, Granlund with the Sedins wasn’t nearly as effective as Vancouver’s memory of it. The trio were on the ice for 20 even-strength goals. Thirteen of them were scored by opponents. This is not great.
The underlying possession data suggests the Sedins were better controlling play with Granlund but not as good as they were with Loui Eriksson. Surprised? Green said Tuesday he would lean on analytics in making decisions like this one, but he added the old cliche about it being just one piece of the puzzle.
Fair enough.
There are no analytics yet on what Green’s favoured combination is. That is playing Thomas Vanek with the Sedins, which someone depicted on Twitter on Tuesday with a GIF of a dog riding a turtle.
The line seems to run counterintuitive when it comes to finding a winger who can make up for the Sedins’ current weaknesses. Generally, the consensus has been they need a winger with speed, who can retrieve pucks and play defence.
Vanek is obviously not strong in any of these areas and had his most success last season playing right wing in a sheltered role. That’s not going to happen with the Sedins.
That’s not to say it can’t work. Vanek is a two-time 40-goal scorer who can produce magic in front of the net. He is great in and around the goal and if the Sedins can maintain possession, they are going to be able to exploit. If they can’t, the line is in big trouble.
2. Is Bo Horvat ready to take the next step?
There is currently no more important Canuck in the evolution of this organization than Horvat.
He’s paid like it. And now there will be expectations he needs to play like it.
This isn’t news to anyone, but Horvat has struggled defensively and if he’s going to become one of the better top six centres in the NHL, his shot suppression has to improve.
Part of this issue, however, has been role. Former coach Willie Desjardins loved him killing penalties, taking on the big toughs on other teams and in turn doing it while taking a high percentage of defensive-zone draws.
This type of deployment hasn’t helped enhance the area Horvat has surprisingly thrived in and that’s producing offence. Things will change for Horvat with Green, but what’s not clear yet is how much.
“I don’t think (Green) will be as patient as Willie was,” Horvat said.
“If things aren’t going well I think he’ll switch the lines up.
“If you score, bang, I think he’ll keep the line together until things are going well.
“I do think it’s good to always be trying to get offensive production.”
What about Horvat’s role specifically under Green?
“I think there will be some adjustments,” Horvat said.
“I do think he’s going to want me to take D-zone draws, especially on my left side. I think he’s going to want me to kill penalties.
“But the main thing he wants this year is four lines to be able to play against any line in the league.”
In theory, if that were to work, it should lighten Horvat’s load, which appeared to get a little heavy late last season when he was consistently facing No. 1 lines.
Horvat understands what’s at stake here and he knows there is going to be increased pressure on him with that new six-year deal that has him making $5.5 million a season.
He said he has to provide more offence. When asked how he was going to do this, unwittingly or not, he essentially cited his shot suppression.
“For me, playing my complete 200-foot game is going to do it,” Horvat said. “If I play well defensively and get out of my own end as fast as possible, and get to their end and create pressure there, eventually the pucks are going to go in.”
Now, that sounds like a player who understands analytics.
3. Can the kids last?
The Canucks stayed true to their word and made room for both Jake Virtanen and Brock Boeser. They made it. For now. Remember, the same thing happened for Virtanen a year ago. He played 10 disappointing regularseason games and by mid-November was sent to Utica for good.
To be decent, the Canucks need to score about 40 more goals this season. Quality years from Boeser and Virtanen would go a long way in making that happen. What we don’t yet know is how patient Green is going to be with them. Will Green live with mistakes? How many bad games can they have before they’re shipped to Utica?
“They’re different players,” Green said. “They bring different elements. I like Brock’s offensive side to his game. I think Jake has brought an offensive side but he brings a different game than Brock. He needs to be aggressive and he needs to be good for the puck. When he starts turning pucks over, that’s the first way you don’t play for any coach in the NHL; when you turn pucks over and you spend time in your own zone because of it.
“Jake’s details have to be good. He knows that. “Brock, I’m still getting to know him as a player. He’s a guy who is supposed to score. Is there pressure? No. He just needs to play well right now. That’s all I care about.”
4. Who is the fourth centre?
Yeah, we know Horvat, Henrik and Brandon Sutter are going to anchor three lines, but who gets the other one?
Many of us expected it to be Sam Gagner, the Canucks’ biggest freeagent target. Gagner was brought in to help on the power play, but also there was a sense he could cover for Henrik in a more prominent role at centre if the Canucks captain got hurt.
But word around the team for a while has been Green likes Gagner more at wing, which brings us back to the most off-the-radar development of the pre-season.
The idea Granlund is likely starting the season as the Canucks’ third-line centre kind of crept up on everyone. Like everything else, this may not last.
There was some hope Alexander Burmistrov could centre a line, but he didn’t exactly light the world on fire in pre-season and Green called him a potential “rover” which sure reads like “13th forward.”
5. Can Loui Eriksson bounce back?
If you score, bang, I think he’ll keep the line together until things are going well. I do think it’s good to always be trying to get offensive production.
Never in the history of time has a $6-million player in a Canadian market been discussed as little as Eriksson has been in the preseason.
He has a forgotten-man element to his current place in the organization. People can safely pick some sort of rebound for Eriksson, but for a legitimate bounce back year, he’s going to need to score 20-plus goals. Eriksson is already sick and tired of revisiting last year’s calamitous 11-goal output and he’s barely been asked about it because he’s barely been interviewed.
He actually should welcome the questions on the topic because if people are asking it means he’s doing something noteworthy, which in his case would be scoring goals.
He looked like he was set for a bounce back in the final pre-season game. But several other games in the pre-season, he was barely noticeable. Come to think of it, that’s how last year went.