The Vancouver Canucks traded J.T. Miller to the New York Rangers nearly three months ago, but the scars of the wounds that weighed heavily on the team are still fresh on the minds of many.
Elias Pettersson, one of the belligerents in the feud and Canucks head coach Rick Tocchet chimed in in reflection of one of the darkest moments in the lost 2024-25 season.
Interestingly, neither of them pinned much blame on the long-term incident as a whole. It was what it was.
"It's definitely not something either of us could prepare for, the way it blew up," Pettersson admitted during the Canucks' locker room clean out day. "That was the focal point, not if we win or lose. Yeah, maybe we weren't the best of friends, but we respected each other as teammates. That's what I want to say."
Through the Miller trade, Pettersson was just seventh on the Canucks in on-ice goals at 5-on-5 with 25, and was on the ice for 25 goals against at 5-on-5, per Natural Stat Trick.
Pettersson was 11th in Corsi percentage with a negative value of 49.53%, trailing Miller, Pius Suter, Phil Di Giuseppe, and Jonathan Lekkerimaki, among others.
In short, the 25-year-old former 100-point-scorer was stuck in second gear for much of the season until Miller was offloaded by Canucks management. By then, it was too late.
"There's some stuff there, even before I got here. What level, I don't know," Tocchet added matter-of-factly. "Did it get uncomfortable? Yeah. A lot of meetings, a lot of things. Could something have gone different? . . . You don't think we tried all that stuff? It just didn't work out.
"I know everybody is looking for a bad guy. I don't know if there's a bad guy in the thing. It didn't work out, and at that point, it had to be resolved, and that's what happened. It's unfortunate."
Tocchet made it a point to lash out at online critics a bit with his answer, and praised both Miller and Pettersson for how well they had performed prior to this season.
That said, the void created by Miller's departure leaves the Canucks with more questions than answers heading into the future.