VANCOUVER – The most consistent thing about the Vancouver Canucks is COVID-19, which remains undefeated after two of the few remaining players untouched by the coronavirus this winter were run down by Omicron during the NHL All-Star break.
One of those was star defenceman Quinn Hughes, who was added to COVID protocol on Monday as most – but not all – of his teammates resumed training at Rogers Arena.
Forward Elias Pettersson, who tested positive in January, missed Monday afternoon’s practice due to what coach Bruce Boudreau said were non-COVID-related flu symptoms and defenceman Tucker Poolman continued his mysterious absence due to an undefined illness. Boudreau insisted Poolman is not suffering long-haul symptoms from his recent bout with COVID.
Checking winger Matthew Highmore was the other Canuck who went into protocol on Monday, leaving – by unofficial count – only defenceman Oliver Ekman-Larsson and young forwards Nils Hoglander and Vasily Podkolzin untouched by Omicron.
There was an inevitability to Hughes, easily the best Canucks skater this season, contracting the virus. It feels like Omicron is coming for all of us eventually, but at least showing some restraint to those who have backed up their functioning immune systems with vaccinations.
Hughes could have gotten sick on the last road trip or this week’s homestand, which starts Tuesday against the Arizona Coyotes, but instead contracted Omicron during the All-Star break. He is quarantining at home in Michigan, trapped on the wrong side of the Canada-U.S. border, which means the 22-year-old will likely rejoin the Canucks for a Feb. 17 game in San Jose.
Hughes is only one player, and the Canucks have had as many five at a time in COVID protocol. But Hughes is the skater they can least afford to miss. Few players in the NHL can play like he does and move the puck like he can, either with his skating or passing. The Canucks waited five decades for a defencemen like Hughes, and there isn’t an extra one like him hanging around on standby.
The Canucks will just have to survive, which they have done admirably since their COVID conga line began in mid-December. But just surviving won’t get them to the playoffs.
The team started 8-0-1 under Bruce Boudreau after he was hired as coach on Dec. 5, but has scuffled through various absences and schedule interruptions since then, going 4-5-3 after Jan. 1. Vancouver’s five-on-five play and team defence (2.5 goals against per game) have remained excellent, but the Canucks average of 2.17 goals per game since New Year’s Day is nearly last in the NHL, fractionally ahead of the Philadelphia Flyers and Seattle Kraken offences.
Taken as a whole, the two-month turnaround under Boundreau has been quite remarkable, lifting the Canucks back to .500 (currently 20-20-6) and in the vapour trails of the Western Conference playoff race.
But they need wins, not just loser points, and the precariousness of the team’s standing ahead of the March 21 trade deadline is re-enforced by the Canucks management summit going on this week and the presence at Monday practice of president Jim Rutherford’s newly-constructed hockey-operations department: general manager Patrik Allvin sitting with new AGMs Derek Clancy and Emile Castonguay, joined by incumbent player-development boss Ryan Johnson and special advisors Daniel and Henrik Sedin.
Winning or losing this month doesn’t change the clear need for upgrades to the Canucks’ roster, which includes building some cap flexibility that Rutherford said is vital. But losing this week – the New York Islanders are at Rogers Arena on Wednesday before the Toronto Maple Leafs visit Saturday – are likely to expedite the changes even though Rutherford has said, “ideally,” he’d like to give this group of players the chance to make the playoffs.
It will be impossible to watch the Canucks play and not notice the absence of Hughes. But there’s no free pass for losing because one of the most dynamic defencemen in the world is taking his turn in COVID protocol.
“If you look at the amount of goals that he creates from the back end, (on) a team that is somewhat offensively challenged ... I mean, that's going to be the challenge right there,” Boudreau said of Hughes. “He's a great player. We've gone with (J.T.) Miller and (Bo) Horvat being out at the same time. We've gone with (Thatcher) Demko being out and (Jaroslav) Halak at the same time, so we're going to go through with this.”
Pettersson reported to the rink on Monday before the Canucks sent him home, so he may be available to play on Tuesday. His offensive slump is representative of a team that, for all its flaws, was supposed to score goals this year with its talented forwards at the top of the lineup.
But the Canucks have scored about as often for Boudreau (2.52 per game) as they did under previous coach Travis Green (2.36).
“I think the five-on-five play, our defensive play, has been really good,” Horvat, the captain, said Monday. “(But) I don't think we've even come close to what we can produce offensively.
"I think a lot of us, including myself, has a lot more to give offensively. I think that, honestly, is a good problem to have. We haven't even ... reached our peak of being our most offensive, and we're still winning hockey games, and we're still doing a lot of good things away from the puck. It's just a matter of time ... for us to break through.”
With just 11 goals in 46 games this season, Pettersson had only four shots on target during the four-game road trip that preceded the weekend break.
“It's not like he hasn't been told,” Boudreau said. “I try to tell him to be more selfish. Matter of fact, in Nashville (a 4-2 Canucks loss last Tuesday), I told him to start shooting the puck more, and next shift he went out, shot the puck and hit the cross bar. But that was his last shot of the game.
"I would love him to get four or five shots on goal a game. And I think ... the rest of the group would too.”
• With Hughes and Poolman out, the Canucks defence pairs on Monday were Ekman-Larsson-Noah Juulsen, Luke Schenn-Tyler Myers, and Brad Hunt-Kyle Burroughs. Jason Dickinson took Pettersson’s left wing spot on a line with Horvat and Conor Garland, while the top line was Miller between wingers Brock Boeser and Tanner Pearson.
