Hutton the hope for the future?
Rookie defenceman has already blasted through his expected ceiling
It is both sad and true: the Vancouver Canucks have had just one 50-point defenceman in the past 20 years. And at that, Christian Ehrhoff needed a goal on the final night of the 2010-11 regular season to claw his way to the number.
Simply put, offence has not oozed from the Canucks blueline at any point in the team’s history, and most certainly not these past few years.
Alex Edler flirted with 50 a season after Ehrhoff, but came up a point short and has never come close again.
And now as Edler closes in on his 30th birthday, it’s highly unlikely his game will change.
He’s a big-minute guy who can play in all situations, but he shows no indications of threatening the 50-point mark ever again.
We know he won’t get there this year after suffering a cracked fibula in Denver on Tuesday night. Edler’s season is now on hold for six weeks leaving him little opportunity to add to his 20 points upon his return.
Edler’s offensive contributions this season have not been significant, but his absence from the lineup most definitely is. It’s a massive blow to a team still clinging to playoff hopes and ultimately one that this hockey club may not be able to overcome.
But if any good can emerge from all of this, it’s that the Canucks now have a golden opportunity to accelerate Ben Hutton’s development.
Wednesday in Arizona offered definite promise. Just one night after Edler’s injury, the Canucks leaned on Hutton, playing him a careerhigh 23:14 — more than five minutes longer than he had played the night before. And like everything else in his first season in the NHL, the 22-year-old rookie handled it easily and looked like he could have shouldered more. So give it to him. Play him. Play him a bunch. Play him in all situations. Let him run the first-unit power play and learn from the Sedins. Maybe he can help them, too. This is a power play that has been sputtering at 12 per cent over the past 20 games. Put the kid on the point and let’s see if he can’t breathe some new life into things.
At even strength, keep him paired with Chris Tanev and give him carte blanche to take chances — not recklessly but within reason — safe in the knowledge that one of the best defensive defencemen in the league will have his back.
Let’s get a glimpse at how good Ben Hutton might be when put in positions to succeed.
Hutton has been one of the best stories on this team since the first day of training camp with his poise under pressure and his ability to skate the puck out of trouble and lead the transition game.
His tape-to-tape stretch pass to Jannik Hansen on the Canucks’ first goal of the season in Calgary was a sign of things to come. And there’s been no looking back.
Nor should there. Everything about Hutton should be done with an eye to the future. As the Canucks wrestle with this rebuild on the fly, it’s clear now that Hutton will be a big part of the young nucleus that will eventually emerge from the shadows. And with that smile of his that’s always on display, Hutton certainly has the makings of one of the new faces of the franchise down the road.
So use this opportunity now to groom him to be a power play quarterback and a guy other teams will have to guard against and game plan for. Help Hutton become that rare breed of defencemen who can control play from their position and make those around them better.
Hutton has already displayed attributes no one else on the Canucks depth chart possesses. In managed minutes, he has 15 points in his first 47 games in the league, and with Edler out, could very well wind up as the Canucks’ highest-scoring defenceman this season.
Can he get to 50 points some day? He’s demonstrated enough good signs already to make you think so. So he must be given every opportunity to reach his potential, and this stretch of games could be his launching pad.
Fifty points, by the way, is no guarantee of any kind of team success. But after too many seasons of failed Canucks teams stocked with 20- and 30-point defencemen, Ben Hutton looks like he could be an element this organization has been missing for far too long. And he represents hope for better days ahead.