The Vancouver Canucks totalled 764 penalty minutes as a team in the 2023-24 regular season — placing them 14th in the NHL in that metric. This was a slight uptick from their team penalty totals in 2022-23 when they took 734 penalty minutes, but that was enough to rank them 11th in the league.
Leading Vancouver in 2023-24 was Nikita Zadorov, who recorded 102 penalty minutes as a Canuck. If you combine his Canucks stats with those he accrued with the Calgary Flames at the start of last season, Zadorov finishes sixth in the league in penalty minutes, putting up 125 total last season.
Zadorov's 102 were the most penalty minutes in a single season by a Canuck, since Antoine Roussel's 118 in 2018-19.
Vancouver's defence has been their leading source of penalties in recent history. The Canucks' top two penalized players in each of the last five seasons have been defencemen.
Tyler Myers led the team in 2021-22 and 2022-23, followed by Luke Schenn in both years. In 2019-20 and 2020-21, Alexander Edler was the team leader, followed by Myers both seasons.
The correlation between penalty minutes and success
More penalty minutes don't necessarily lead to playoff success, but it's worth noting that this year's Stanley Cup champion Florida Panthers were second in the league with 1,106 PIM as a team. However, only one other team in the top 10 penalized squads last season made it out of the first round of the playoffs — the Edmonton Oilers, who beat the Canucks in the second round and lost to the Panthers in the finals.
Conversely, the least-penalized team in 2023-24 was the Dallas Stars, who lost to the Oilers in the Western Conference Final.
The two most penalized teams in the 2024 playoffs were the Oilers and Panthers, having played at least seven more games than any other team. But Edmonton and Florida were able to supplement their time in the box with excellent penalty killing. The Oilers had the best penalty kill during the playoffs, operating at just above 94 percent. The Panthers were second, as they killed off 88 percent of their penalties.
The Canucks' penalty kill was above average in the playoffs as they killed off 81 percent of their penalties — a number likely buoyed by the Nashville Predators' abysmal 9.1 power play percentage in the first round.
While penalty minutes can be indicative of a team that's a tough playoff matchup, being able to kill off these penalties and avoid conceding goals is arguably more important depending on who the Canucks face in the playoffs down the road. The Oilers, led by superstars Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl, led all playoff teams with 22 goals on the man advantage this spring.
Canucks' improved defensive play a reason for optimism
The Canucks' penalty kill this past season was drastically better than it had been in previous seasons, so fans should be optimistic about the team's defensive structure moving forward. In the 2023-24 regular season, the Canucks were 17th overall with a 79.1 percent penalty kill. In 2022-23, they were last, as their penalty kill dropped to 71.6 percent. The season before that, they were third last at 74.9 percent.
Playing solid defensive hockey is key to playoff success. Under Rick Tocchet's coaching staff, and backed by a rebuilt blue line, the Canucks have improved their defensive play and should continue to climb the league ranks this season. Improving defensively is, at the very least, a necessity for Vancouver to have continued playoff success.