Canucks: 3 takeaways from Jacob Markstrom’s season
Markstrom deserves more league-wide credit
Anybody who watched a handful of Canucks games over the course of this year has to know just how good Markstrom really was. For everybody else, it seems like nobody has a clue about who he is. Canucks fans are used to that, though. The east coast is the center of the NHL world and unfortunately, the majority of North America runs on eastern time.
Pay closer attention and you’d know that Markstrom’s season performance was spectacular and easily worthy of some Vezina Trophy conversation. 23 wins don’t exactly pass for award-winning numbers, but the underlying numbers in advanced stats show that he was simply remarkable.
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By the COVID shutdown, he ranked first place amongst starting goalies in shots against per 60 minutes and held an outer-worldly 13-4 record when facing 35+ shots. He’s the kind of goalie who’s a brick wall when he’s busy and he’s doing things for the Canucks that haven’t been done in quite some time.
According to an article run by Canucks Army, Markstrom was the only goaltender in the entire NHL who didn’t give up a clear sight goal all year. That’s any shot that Markstrom has a clear vision of for a half-second or longer. Every single one of those shots he faced he turned down. In other terms, he never blinked. Not once all season.
Markstrom’s presence in goal is starting to feel like it did when Roberto Luongo was No. 1 for the Canucks. He brings a certain swagger and confidence that can’t be matched and his cat-like reflexes under Clark have him creeping up on the NHL’s top-five goaltenders in my books.