Two Canucks players put on COVID protocol ahead of game vs Blue Jackets

The Vancouver Canucks are scheduled to play against the Columbus Blue Jackets on Tuesday evening but the biggest news of the day is that two players tested positive and were put on COVID protocol.

The Canucks announced that Luke Schenn and Juho Lammikko are the two players that tested positive.

The Canucks also put Travis Hamonic on LTIR and called up Phil Di Giuseppe from Abbotsford.

Schenn was tested on Sunday, before the game against Carolina, and his result came out as positive on Monday. Lammikko was tested on Monday morning and his result came out as positive on Tuesday morning.

All players, coaches and training staff were all tested on Monday and teams are required to be tested every three days according to the NHL’s COVID-19 Protocol.

The Canucks also cancelled their morning skate.

The Canucks had a major COVID outbreak last spring. Both Lammikko and Schenn were not on the team then.

The Hurricanes have their Tuesday evening game against the Minnesota Wild postponed after Jordan Staal, Andrei Svechnikov, Ian Cole and Steven Lorentz tested positive after their morning skate.  Sebastian Aho, Seth Jarvis and a trainer also tested positive on Monday and are still in Vancouver for the time being.

However, none of the Canes players are getting sick according to head coach Rod Brind’Amour.

Numerous players in the NHL are being place on COVID protocol including Mathew Barzal of the New York Islanders, Brad Marchand of the Boston Bruins, (The Bruins were in Vancouver on December 8) and Devon Toews of the Colorado Avalanche.

The Calgary Flames have their games postponed until Thursday with nine players and a staff member testing positive.

At the time of this writing, 23 players have been added to the NHL’s COVID list in the last 36 hours.

It also seems the Nashville Predators also have positive tests.

It’s safe to say all of this is concerning.

The NHL and NHLPA will discuss the latest positive tests on Tuesday night.

Canucks President of Hockey Operations and interim general manager Jim Rutherford spoke to the media via Zoom to discuss the positive tests.

“We’re working through all the league protocol,” said Rutherford per The Athletic’s Thomas Drance. “The players and everybody has been tested again this morning. We’ll get those results later this afternoon.”

Rutherford was asked a time for when the results of the test will be revealed and he said 6 PM. That is one hour before the game.

Rutherford was also asked about cancelling the morning skate.

“It’s our decision, but we work with the players, and there has to be a comfort level here,” he said per Sportsnet 650’s Brendan Batchelor. “No one was comfortable here at the building, nor would we expect them to be.”

There is a possibility that the game against Columbus and further games down the schedule could be postponed but that will be determined if there are more positive tests that come out at 6 PM.  Any player that tests positive has to quarantine.

“I don’t know what guidelines the league uses to cancel games, but it certainly appears that it has to be a bigger number that what we’re dealing with right now,” said Rutherford per Batchelor.

We will provide updates on this story.