Patience is key for a team like the Canucks

The Vancouver Canucks are the third-youngest team in the NHL. With a team this young, inexperience is bound to show. Patience is key for a team like them.

The average age of the Vancouver Canucks is 26.4 years old. There are only two teams younger than the Canucks and it’s the Montreal Canadiens (26.2) and the Carolina Hurricanes (26.3). Four of their top scorers are under the age of 25. Their captain, Bo Horvat, is just 24 years old. Their star scorer, Elias Pettersson, has been legally allowed to drink alcohol in the United States for just 37 days. This is an extremely young team.

Look at the pieces that the Canucks have to build their franchise around. Horvat, Pettersson, Brock Boeser, Quinn Hughes, these are all super young players that have endless potential as they continue to develop in the league. However, they need to establish themselves in the NHL and it’s not going to happen overnight.

Sure, Hughes is showing incredible talent so far, but it’s only been 34 games. Pettersson has 106 career NHL games under his belt and Brock Boeser has yet to play a full season. This group is still new to the league and has yet to even make the playoffs.

For years, this team has been near the bottom of the standings. How can you expect such young players to go from a losing culture to a high-intensity, competitive mentality in one summer? Winning takes time to learn and these players have been in the league for a blink of an eye. One just needs to look at past champions to understand how difficult it is to win.

More from Editorials

• Which team won the Bo Horvat trade?
• What to expect from newcomers Anthony Beauvillier, Aatu Räty
• Back to the future: How the skate uniforms became a regular Canucks’ feature night
• Canucks kick off 2023 with disappointing 6-2 loss to Islanders
• 2nd period penalty trouble sinks Canucks in 4-2 loss against Winnipeg

Alex Ovechkin took 12 years to become a Stanley Cup champion. Tyler Seguin won it in his first season in the league and has yet to win it again. The Tampa Bay Lightning had a historically good season last year and got swept in the first round. Winning in this league is hard and takes years to learn.

The NHL is the hardest league in the world to play. That’s why only the best players are in it. Playing so many games in a 7-month period against the best in the world is difficult, to say the least. To be able to come into every game with a winning mentality while you’re facing off against Connor McDavid or Nathan MacKinnon takes time to develop.

After every Canuck loss, there is blame tossed everywhere. Blame is thrown at Travis Green, Bo Horvat, Brock Boeser, the list goes on. There is impatience among the fanbase and a whole lot of frustration. But here’s the truth. This team is not a Stanley Cup contender this season. They won’t be next season either. If Jim Benning is smart, he will keep this core together and stick with them through all the growing pains.

With young players comes a learning curve. They need to learn to start games at the drop of the puck. They need to learn how to play for a full 60 minutes. How to defend leads, how to get to the front of the net for garbage goals, how to stick through it even though times are tough, how to play an 82 game season. All these are things that the Canucks will learn over time and the best way to learn is to make mistakes.

This is a young team that will make inexperienced mistakes. They will make it this season, they will make it the next, they will keep making it but eventually, they will start going away. The Canucks will grow from their experiences and become a better team every season. However, we need to be patient with them. It can take five years or even 12 as it did for Ovechkin.

But this team has the potential and the important thing is sticking with them through the highs and lows. Patience is key and patience will make the ultimate victory feel that much sweeter.