Pro Hockey Talk Vancouver edition August 11, 2014

[Derp...]

Article I couldn't find on the boards anywhere.

http://prohockeytalk.nbcsports.com/2014/08/11/its-vancouver-canucks-day-at-pht/

Throughout the month of August, PHT will be dedicating a day to all 30 NHL clubs. Today’s team? The Vancouver Canucks.

After back-to-back first round exits under head coach Alain Vigneault, Canucks GM Mike Gillis fired Vigneault and replaced him with John Tortorella under the belief that the new bench boss would make Vancouver a better playoff team. Things obviously didn’t go as planned.

Vancouver ranked 28th in the league in goals scored per game and Tortorella’s system drew a lot of heatdue to those offensive woes. Even the Sedin twins weren’t exempt as Henrik and Daniel finished the campaign with 50 and 47 points respectively.

Without much offensive support, the situation became dire in Vancouver. Although Tortorella initially led them to a 23-11-6 record, the Canucks went into a 13-24-5 free fall. Over the course of that collapse, they were subjected to a number of humbling events.

The Canucks suffered a 9-1 blowout loss to Anaheim on Jan. 15, which was so bad that Ducks coach Bruce Boudreau seemed to expressed some regret for the way his team humiliated Vancouver.

Mere days after that, Tortorella lost his cool due to a game-opening line brawl against Calgary and tried to enter the Flames’ dressing room. That earned him a 15-day suspension.

Vancouver arguably hit rock bottom when it collapsed against the Islanders on March 10. The Canucks had a 3-0 lead in that game before they conceded seven goals in the third period. Ryan Kesler, who is now with Anaheim after requesting a trade, called that collapse embarrassing.

What’s the good news for Vancouver? All of that is in the past now.

Offseason recap

The Canucks have been nothing if not active this summer. For starters Gills and Tortorella are out in Vancouver and have been replaced by new GM Jim Benning and head coach Willie Desjardins. The Canucks also named Trevor Linden as the team president in April.

As mentioned above, the Canucks accommodated Kesler by trading him and a 2015 third round pick to Anaheim in exchange for Nick Bonino, Luca Sbisa, a 2014 first round pick (Jared McCann), and a third round selection. The Canucks then sent that third round pick to the Rangers to get Derek Dorsett while New York drafted Keegan Iverson.

On top of all that, the Canucks dealt Jason Garrison, Jeff Costello, and a 2015 seventh round selection to the Tampa Bay Lightning for a second round pick, which they then used to get 23-year-old forward Linden Vey from the Kings. Los Angeles drafted Roland McKeown with the pick.

They also signed goaltender Ryan Miller to a three-year, $18 million contract and forward Radim Vrbata to a two-year, $10 million deal.

[BanTSN]

I don't get it. The article is just a recap and it offers no opinion on what the team could expect to acheive for the upcoming season. Isn't it now past recap time and more into prognosis time?

I totally forgot about that Islander game though. Wow that was a low blow to the team, for sure. In that game Kesler had to play 24 minutes and Henrik 20mins to keep it from being even more embarrassing. Daniel was out and there was just too many empty jerseys in the lineup. Higgins had to play 20mins as well.

On thing i'd change on the PK is to put Hansen there and take Higgins off. But other than that there wasn't much more Torts could do that game. It's not like he had this arsenal of players who could just step in and take over when a player like Daniel Sedin goes down. We're still in that position going into this season, except now there's no 20+ minute Kesler to use anymore.