Vancouver Canucks takeaways: Team must address secondary scoring
Here at The Canuck Way, we’ll look at 10 takeaways from the Vancouver Canucks 2018-19 season. At Number 9, the team needs to address their lack of secondary scoring.
I don’t care if it’s through a trade, free agency, or by a player from the Utica Comets making a huge jump next season. The Vancouver Canucks need to get some secondary scoring. They cannot rely solely on their star players to provide them with all of their offence.
Let’s take a look at the players who picked up the most goals and points for the team this year. Elias Pettersson led the team in both goals (28) and points (66). We know he had a historic season and showed that he truly is the new face of the franchise.
Future captain Bo Horvat was the only Canuck to play all 82 games this season, and trailed only Pettersson in both goals (27) and points (61). These numbers are even more impressive for Horvat if you take into account the seemingly endless carousel of wingers he saw on his line all season long.
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Then there’s Brock Boeser, who, in just 69 games this season, potted 26 goals and 56 points. Boeser was nominated for the Calder trophy in his rookie season two years ago, and had a fairly solid sophomore season. All three of these players showed that they are capable of leading this team back to the playoffs.
Aside from these three players though, the list is pretty underwhelming. Alex Edler was the Canucks fourth-leading scorer with 34 points. Then there’s Antoine Roussel, who managed to pick up 31, followed by Loui Eriksson (29), Nikolay Goldobin (27), and Jake Virtanen (25). The fact of the matter is that those numbers just aren’t good enough.
The big three for the Canucks went through slumps this season, as most players do. The difference is, those star players on other teams have a much better supporting cast to keep their team’s hopes alive even when those star players aren’t at their best.
The team needs to learn from this year, and cannot afford to make more signings of bottom six forwards and ageing veterans. As most of you know, I support Jim Benning and think he did an excellent job of addressing this need through the season with the acquisitions of Tanner Pearson and Josh Leivo, but there is still work that needs to be done.
Next. A look at the goaltending depth chart. dark
Watching games this year showed us that the Canucks need more secondary scoring, and I fully believe that Benning and his group will be able to pull off a few more key trades or big signings this offseason to help the cause and really put this team over the hump next season.