The Vancouver Canucks are a very good hockey club.
That’s been evident throughout the course of the season as the Canucks have been near or on top of the NHL’s overall standings.
But winning the President’s Trophy as the best regular season team doesn’t always translate into a Stanley Cup championship or even a deep playoff run.
Since the turn of the century, only four teams that have finished first in the overall standings have managed to win it all – the Colorado Avalanche in ‘01, the Detroit Red Wings in ’02 and ’08 and the Chicago Blackhawks in ’13.
In fact, in the last decade no President’s Trophy winner has managed to get to the Cup Finals never mind win it. Only the New York Rangers were able to advance past the second round making it to the Eastern Conference Finals in 2014-15 before bowing out.
Looking at it even deeper, you’ll find that in the last decade there have been only two Stanley Cup champions that have even finished in the top three in the overall standings.
So what gives?
Sometimes it’s the fact that a team really hasn’t faced any adversity throughout the year and is ill-equipped to handle it when it arrives in the post-season.
Just ask anyone associated with last year’s Boston Bruins.
Sometimes it’s the inability to play the ‘heavy hockey’ that is required to win in the playoffs.
The time and space needed for making high-skilled plays is reduced as the season progresses and by the time the playoffs roll around, that time and space is at a premium as post-season success is based on winning battles and scoring ugly goals.
For Rick Tocchet and the Canucks coaching staff, adapting to that shift is probably one of the bigger challenges they face heading into the post-season.
It’s safe to say most people within the league would identify the Canucks as a ‘speed team’ rather than a ‘heavy team’ such as the defending Stanley Cup champion Vegas Golden Knights.
So how do the Canucks adjust to the disappearance of time and space?
It has to be a collective effort according to Tocchet.
“I wish we were a little bit better on the boards (and) be a better wall team. We want to make plays. We want to scoot and play fast but I think if everyone can get better by five per cent…we’ve got some guys that will never be great wall guys – let’s face it – and that’s okay. But can they play five or ten per cent better on the wall or win the battle? That’s the way we are approaching it here. I think if everyone can get better, that’s how we can get better as a team,” explained Tocchet.
For Tocchet and the coaching staff, that means emphasizing the techniques to be successful in practice and emphasizing it to the point where it becomes habitual in games.
“I have certain techniques on how to go into a battle and how to be a wall guy but to apply it…it’s hard in real time sometimes. I get it but you got to stick with it in the pressure situations. You have to think technique but it has to come organically. Doing a lot of reps helps and guys have gotten better – don’t get me wrong – from the start of the year,” he noted.
Probably the best example of that has been Brock Boeser, who will never be mistaken as a power forward, but who has improved in winning one-on-one battles along the boards.
This spring is a different animal for the hockey club.
Playing out the string has been replaced by high-pressure games that actually mean something as the team tries to hone its craft with the playoffs approaching.
Case in point was Wednesday’s disappointing 4-3 overtime loss to the Colorado Avalanche at Rogers Arena.
According to Tocchet, no one stepped up in the critical moments of that game and won some of those battles when they were needed but he also believes that there was a silver lining in the loss in that it was a pressure situation that the players hopefully learned from.
“I think the more games we can play under pressure, it’s good for guys to get better. It’s like 3-2 and you know the puck is coming and it’s a big play. Either you got to get it out or make a play – those are the times that you’re looking at the players and they’ve got to make that play seven, eight or nine times out of ten,” said Tocchet.
OVERTIME
* Tensions boiled over during practice on Thursday at Rogers Arena when Filip Hronek and Conor Garland got into a minor dust-up during a battle drill.
* Based on the pairings at practice expect to see Tyler Myers back in the lineup Saturday against the Washington Capitals at Rogers Arena after a five-game absence due to injury. Myers was paired with Carson Soucy during drills while Noah Juulsen appeared to be the odd man out as he was teamed with Mark Friedman.
* Former Canucks President and General Manager Brian Burke took in the game against Colorado. Burke was in town as the keynote speaker for Thursday’s KPMG Thunderbird Scholarship Breakfast benefitting UBC Athletics. Burke made a point of stopping in to visit Daniel and Henrik Sedin.
* NHL Network analyst Cory Schneider wasn’t too bullish on his former team when it came to ranking the top teams in the Western Conference. Schneider had Dallas on top followed by Winnipeg, Edmonton, Colorado and Vancouver. Fellow analyst Brian Boyle didn’t even have the Canucks in the top five electing to go with Dallas, Winnipeg, Vegas, Edmonton and Colorado as his choices.
Veteran B.C. sports personality Bob “the Moj” Marjanovich writes twice weekly for Black Press Media.
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