Vancouver Canucks: What does the future hold for Jacob Markstrom?

As Jacob Markstrom enters the final season of his contract, it’s not too early to wonder if this could be his last year with the Vancouver Canucks.

Jacob Markstrom is coming off the best season of his career, and the Vancouver Canucks will continue to lean heavily on him as they push for the playoffs in 2020.

Markstrom set a career-high 28 wins in 2018-19, with a 2.77 goals against average and .912 save percentage. He was named the team MVP over rookie sensation and Calder Trophy winner Elias Pettersson.

The 29-year-old Markstrom is entering the final season of a three-year, $11 million pact. If he can match or improve his performance in 2018-19, Markstrom will be worthy of a new contract — one that could pay him around $6 million a season. Maybe more.

But the Canucks have a difficult decision to make with Markstrom here. He may be their No. 1 goalie right now, but backup Thatcher Demko — has been long viewed as the team’s netminder of the future.

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And of course, the Canucks employ one of the game’s elite goalie prospects in Michael DiPietro. Both he and Demko have the skill sets to become world-class goalies. Markstrom turns 30 next January, and we still don’t know how high his ceiling is.

The Canucks, by the way, can only protect one goalie in the 2021 expansion draft. It’s hard to envision the Canucks choosing to protect Markstrom — who’ll be 31 then — over Demko — who will be entering his age-25 season.

General manager Jim Benning has a tough decision to make here regarding his goalies. If Demko plays lights out and wins the starting job, the Canucks would probably shop Markstrom at the trade deadline or let him leave in free agency next year.

But what if Markstrom is still Vancouver’s No. 1 goalie, and Demko isn’t quite ready to take over as the top guy? That scenario would put Benning and the Canucks in a bind.

Markstrom will be one of the top goalies in next year’s free agent class, and he’ll certainly want to get paid what he’s worth. It’s impossible to envision him signing a short-term deal (in this case, it would be for one year), like Alexander Edler did, which would prevent the Canucks from having to protect Markstrom in the expansion draft.

Would the Canucks break the bank to retain Markstrom, when he’ll be 30 years of age? That seems unlikely, since they have two up-and-coming goalies in Demko and DiPietro. So Benning has to think about how he wants to go about Markstrom’s contract year.

He could see if Markstrom would sign a three or four-year deal without no-movement protection, which would allow Vancouver to expose him to Seattle. That would be the ideal scenario, but it’s also easier said than done.

Right now, Benning and head coach Travis Green will go with Markstrom and Demko as their two goalies. And if the former retains his status as the starter, the Canucks will have to make a difficult decision. They don’t have to decide what to do with Markstrom now, but the front office has to have a plan in place for every possible scenario.