Breaking: The Vancouver Canucks have been very, very good.
Which brings us to the obvious question: are they very, very good, in a sustainable way?
I’m pretty sure Canucks fans haven’t watched their team rattle off nine wins in 12 tries and hope to read some “well actually” stat article that says they haven’t been awesome, or won’t be. And don’t worry, this isn’t that. Canucks fans should most certainly be enjoying the ride, which has been built on superb hockey.
But I do want to just lay out what the numbers say so far, simply so they can have a peek under the hood and set expectations a bit, since most had the Canucks pegged as a fringe playoff team coming into the season. As things currently sit, they’re second in the Western Conference, three points up on the chasing Colorado Avalanche and Los Angeles Kings, behind only the Vegas Golden Knights.
Vancouver is 9-2-1, they have a league-best plus-30 goal differential, and they’ve basically made the Edmonton Oilers have an existential crisis. Their best players have their names in early conversations for the Norris, the Vezina, the Selke, and the Hart. Their coach is the betting favourite for the Jack Adams. Yes, they have some inflated numbers, but having inflated numbers can be sustainable when you have elite players.
That said, the Canucks are currently on pace for 130 points, a mark only hit by the 1977 Canadiens, the 1996 Red Wings, and last year’s Bruins. They’re probably not that.
So what are they?
It’s not unreasonable to suggest the Canucks have not had a particularly tough schedule to start the season. Sportradar has them with the 31st-hardest schedule to date, meaning only one team has had a softer schedule out of the gate (this is all based on early-season winning percentages, so doesn’t mean a ton yet). Still, you can only beat the teams you play, and they’ve beaten the brakes off just about everyone. If you’re a schedule-watcher, it helps that their “remaining strength of schedule” isn’t overly taxing either, as 22 NHL clubs are set to face tougher opponents on their way to April.
The Canucks' numbers may be the hardest to make sense of, league-wide, because they’ve been leading so many of their games (and often by more than one), which affects the way their opponents would play and, by extension, the numbers. Their opponents have had to take more chances, which leads to more chances both ways.
With that caveat out of the way, the Canucks are first in the NHL in goals for, check.
SportLogiq has them at 17th in expected goals for, a concern for which the argument above (teams are taking chances against them) doesn’t fully explain. It is possible, though, that by holding leads the Canucks haven’t pressed as much later in games.
I looked into that. Here I’ve broken down their goals and expected goals by period, for insight there:
By expected goals, you can see that they’ve dialled it back in the third, obviously pushing way less. If the games were closer, maybe their expected goals would hold closer to the 1.08 of the first two periods, which would push them higher up the league’s expected goals leaderboard.
Overall on the offensive front though, Vancouver's season averages haven’t been shining past raw goals, as they’re 25th in shots, 24th in slot shots, and 15th in inner slot shots. They’re just inside the top-10 in O-zone possession time, but I DO think these numbers would be affected by protecting leads and not needing to push. (Still, you’d think they’d create more off the rush given the game states they’ve played in, yet they’re 30th in the league in rush chances.)
In all, the Canucks are killing it in “actual to expected goals” (second-best in the league) which has led to all this “actual to expected attention.”
The one thing that makes me believe this Canucks offence should be sustainably good (like in the 5th-15th range in the NHL) is that their forechecking has been relentless.
They’re first in the NHL in forecheck chances this season and have created the third-most attempts from the slot off that forecheck. Makes sense, when you consider the speed and doggedness of most of their forwards. That forecheck helps defensively too, as teams rarely reach the Canucks' D-zone after they’ve been hunting pucks (third-best in league there). Point is, when the Canucks get on the forecheck, the puck typically stays in the offensive zone for them, and good things happen from there.
Conclusion: The offence should hold
And I don’t mean “hold” as in they’ll be the number one offence in the league by goals per game, as they currently are. I mean that they’ll be in that 5-15 range I referenced above, which is good enough to win a lot of hockey games.
As for the defence, well, it’s thrived on the surface too, sitting second in the NHL in goals against, which really is the only category that matters when the final buzzer sounds.
They’re on the right half of the league in expected goals against, 12th league wide. That gap means they’re first in the NHL in “actual to expected goals against,” which fans will undoubtedly say is sustainable when you have elite goaltending. (And they wouldn’t be wrong, it’s just a lot to ask for a guy to maintain through a season and on in to the playoffs.)
It's a pretty unique team defensively, in that they do some things extraordinarily well, and others quite poorly. For example, they’re second in the NHL in forecheck chances against, thanks to the reality that Quinn Hughes is absolutely dominating the league through its first month.
Hughes skates the puck out of trouble like no one else right now (hence why nobody can forecheck them), but what’s so impressive is how involved he is every time he’s out there. Stathletes has a raw stat that’s just “puck carries,” like how many times has each player carried the puck this season. Hughes sits at 579 carries (there’s only been 12 games!), while the next highest total in the league is Shea Theodore, who’s done the same about 90 fewer times. Hughes controls the pace and direction of the game like only the best players in the world can, and since he also plays a ton the Canucks don’t give up many forecheck chances.
On the other hand, Vancouver is 31st in the NHL in rebound chances against, and they’re 28th in inner slot shots against. Most of their other defensive metrics are pretty average, but as mentioned, would be influenced by teams chasing the games and throwing pucks on net from everywhere. Even with that, it’s tough to see the Canucks as a top five defensive team this year. When you give up that many high danger chances against with the plan being “cross fingers and hope the goalie is great,” the 10-20 range seems more likely.
Conclusion: Defence is probably around league average, maybe a dash better
None of that matters if your goalie is the best in the league, which is how you end up as the league’s “actual to expected goals” leader. It’s also one of the reasons why everyone can take their PDO stat, and…calm down about it. PDO is a combination of a team’s shooting percentage and save percentage, which usually averages out to around 100, league-wide. It’s like plus-minus in that it doesn't tell us much about teams in the middle of the pack, but if you're at either extreme end, it probably means something. In this case, it typically shows teams that have been super lucky or unlucky.
In the end, great teams are able to beat the concept of “everyone regresses to 100" because they have elite shooters, and/or great goaltending. The Canucks can make the case for both. Still, knowing they have a sky-high PDO number (109, the highest in the league), it’s clear they’ll have some bad shooting days and even the odd poor goalie performance to balance it all out. But that stat alone doesn’t kill a team's odds when they've got the talent.
I’m a big Thatcher Demko believer, and think this is one area of the Canucks roster where things will hold strong for them.
Conclusion: Goaltending should remain in the 1-5 range this season
With all these conclusions -- which are just my opinions, based on viewings and these stats -- it looks like this (without adding players): An offence that’s 5th to 15th, a defence that’s 10th-20th, and a goalie who should be a 1st-5th range guy. Not only is that a playoff team, it’s probably good enough to avoid the wild card hunt. Factor in a great power play and middling penalty kill (the latter of which is much more fixable), and the Canucks' range of possible outcomes includes some higher end results that didn’t seem possible just a month ago.
If nothing else, the great start allows the Canucks to play with composure, rather than desperation. Even just .500 hockey from here gets them into the post-season. They shouldn’t be squeezing their sticks, they should believe in the way Rick Tocchet wants them to play, and all those things should lead to better overall team structure and results.
In a country with so many flailing teams right now, the Canucks are a bright star in a dim sky. It looks like they’ve got enough gas to burn through the year, and into the post-season, too.
