After a long, mostly quiet offseason, the Vancouver Canucks opened training camp on Thursday with very few new additions and a lot of question marks in the forward group. While it’s veteran-laden, with not a lot of opportunity for prospects to crack the lineup, there will be plenty of intrigue when it comes to position battles, line combinations, and who will take the two (potentially three) open roster spots.
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The defence features a similar logjam, with only two spots open: one next to Derek Forbort, and the other, sitting in the press box as the seventh/eighth defenceman. As for goaltending, no battle exists there, with Thatcher Demko and Kevin Lankinen forming the hopefully elite duo in the crease.
So, with the stage set, let’s dive into five battles that will play out over training camp and the preseason.
Battle 1. Elias Pettersson’s Linemates
The Combatants: Brock Boeser, Jake DeBrusk, Evander Kane, Conor Garland, Kiefer Sherwood, Nils Hoglander, Drew O’Connor, Jonathan Lekkerimaki
All eyes have been on Elias Pettersson since the start of the offseason to see how he would prepare for the season ahead. The early results are positive, as he impressed Adam Foote in the fitness testing on Wednesday, scoring high in the first test of the day. “The first test he did very well, and it’s a type of test that, if he did the work in the summer compared to last year, he might not. He had to do the work to get the number. It’s a great start,” the new head coach said.
With the Canucks’ de facto number one centre seemingly ready to take the league by storm this season, the question of who will play with him will need to be answered. While the first day of training camp had him with Brock Boeser and Jake DeBrusk, other players will get the chance to play with him as well, including the only notable addition in the offseason, Evander Kane.
A lot of people, myself included, want to see what Pettersson can do with a player like Kane, a gritty, in-your-face forward who won’t hesitate to lay someone out if they take liberties on him. He demands attention, not only for his physicality, but also for his willingness to go to the net and battle in the high-danger areas. Like DeBrusk, he’s money within a few feet of the goaltender, finishing with 13 high-danger goals and 78 high-danger shots in 2023-24 (83rd and 94th percentile, respectively, in the NHL that season). That type of effectiveness around the net should open the ice up more for Pettersson to use his creativity and lethal wrist shot, which wasn’t seen enough last season.
Conor Garland, Nils Hoglander (a common linemate of Pettersson’s in the past with 630:04 of ice time since 2022-23), Jonathan Lekkerimaki and even Kiefer Sherwood and Drew O’Connor will also likely get chances to play with Pettersson during training camp. O’Connor, in particular, might be an interesting option, considering he’s played and had success with Sidney Crosby in Pittsburgh. Not to mention, he would bring a lot of speed to the equation. Whatever the case, it will be interesting to see how some of these players do with Pettersson in the preseason, because I can guarantee we will probably see them all at some point.
Battle 2. Filip Chytil’s Linemates
The Combatants: Same as Battle 1
As I detailed in his player preview recently, Filip Chytil is the Canucks’ second line centre right now, and barring a last-minute trade before the start of the season, he will remain in that role when the puck drops on Oct. 9. Like Pettersson, the question is, who will play with him? The candidates are the same as the battle above, with all eight players legitimate options to line up with the 26-year-old Czech native. The two I would like to see again are O’Connor and Boeser, a duo that seemed to click with him before Jason Dickinson’s dirty hit ended his season in March. They out-chanced the opposition 30-18 at five-on-five and had a 54.84 Corsi for percentage (CF%) playing together, making it an intriguing option to try out again.
Battle 3. 3rd Line Centre
The Combatants: Teddy Blueger & Aatu Raty
Looking at the depth chart, the Canucks’ biggest weakness is at centre. General manager Patrik Allvin tried to address it in the offseason, but with prices, in president Jim Rutherford’s words, “sky high”, they chose not to make a move, leaving Teddy Blueger and Aatu Raty as the two centres behind Chytil and Pettersson.
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That means there will be a battle for the third-line centre job and likely the right to play between Sherwood and Hoglander. Raty closed last season with Sherwood and now-former Canuck Dakota Joshua, and looked to be forming chemistry with the duo. Unfortunately, that line won’t be a thing this season, but given Raty’s underlying stats with Sherwood (54.10 CF%, 35-23 high-danger chances, 73-51 scoring chances, seven high-danger goals for), he should be joined at the hip with him to start.
Whether that is on the third or fourth line remains to be seen. With his veteran status, Blueger will probably get the first crack at the third-line centre spot, but if Raty shows more offence and faceoff prowess like he did towards the end of 2024-25, that role will be his in no time. After all, he did finish with a very impressive 57.7 faceoff percentage, far better than Blueger’s 50.2.
Battle 4. Winger on the 4th Line & Extra Forwards
The Combatants: Linus Karlsson, Arshdeep Bains, Jonathan Lekkerimaki, Max Sasson, Vitali Kravtsov, Nils Aman
There will be a fierce battle in training camp and the preseason for the final winger spot on the fourth line, and who will make up the extra forwards. With Lekkerimaki as the only player who can be freely sent down to Abbotsford without clearing waivers, this battle will be the most interesting to watch. Will it be Vitali Kravtsov after two impressive seasons in the Kontinental Hockey League (KHL) or one of the players who just led Abbotsford to its first Calder Cup victory? We will find out in just a few short weeks.
Battle 5. Sixth & Seventh Defencemen
The Combatants: Elias Pettersson, Tom Willander, Pierre-Olivier Joseph, Victor Mancini, Kirill Kudryavtsev
The final notable battle is over who takes the two open spots in the defence corps. Apart from veteran Pierre-Olivier Joseph, it will be waged between several youngsters in Elias Pettersson, Tom Willander, Victor Mancini and Kirill Kudryavtsev. Of the five, Pettersson or Joseph probably has the inside track on the job next to Forbort, but the coaching staff will give Willander every opportunity to take it from them. He was paired with him to open training camp on Thursday, and he is a great partner to start his career with, given his 550 games in the NHL.
The thing is, Pettersson has a huge leg up on his countryman. He played a solid 28 games in the NHL last season and looked like a seasoned veteran. He also just had a man against boys performance at the recently completed Prospects Showdown, and might already be too good for the American Hockey League (AHL).
Mancini will also get strong consideration for one of the spots. He stood out in the Calder Cup Playoffs with his mobility and hockey IQ, and looked good last season in the 16 games he played in Vancouver following the trade from the New York Rangers.
Finally, there’s Kudryavtsev, who blew everyone away in his rookie campaign and Calder Cup debut in the AHL, with five goals and 26 points in 65 regular season games and a goal and 10 points in the playoffs, along with a combined plus-36 in the plus/minus column (plus-18 in both). He also played two solid games in the NHL at the end of the season, and didn’t look out of place. All in all, the odds are the longest for him to make the team, but I wouldn’t count him out either.
Canucks Preseason Hockey Is On the Horizon
Don’t look now, Canucks fans, but preseason hockey is just around the corner, with the first coming on Sunday (Sept. 21) against the Seattle Kraken. All of these battles will be fun to watch throughout the festivities as we wait for the franchise’s 55th season to kick off on Oct. 9 against Dustin Wolf and the Calgary Flames.
