Ahead of Tuesday's slate of NHL games, the Vancouver Canucks' goalie situation is not exactly inspiring much confidence. They are ranked 20th in average goals allowed per game at 3.18 and 23rd with a team save percentage of .890.
Following a fantastic start to the 2024-25 season, in which he kept the Canucks afloat, Kevin Lankinen's star has begun to fade. He's 1-3-0 in his past four starts, in the process recording a .850 save percentage and 4.24 Goals Against Average (GAA).
Meanwhile, Artūrs Šilovs has for the most part failed to recapture his playoff heroics of last season. He went winless and recorded a nightmare .797 save percentage along with a 5.00 GAA in three October starts, as he fell firmly out of favour behind Lankinen.
Now yes, Šilovs did save 28 of 29 shots in his most recent start against the Chicago Blackhawks, resulting in his first win of the 2024-25 campaign. However it is just one game, and it's fair to assume that Canucks fans are probably feeling a little nervous all around with their goaltenders.
Demko set to return?
With this in mind, there was an update on the goalie front during Monday, in respect of the currently injured Thatcher Demko. And in theory, it's excellent news for everyone concerned in Vancouver.
The update came courtesy of NHL Insider Darren Dreger, during an appearance on TSN. Dreger said:
""He is closer to a return. He's a full participant in practice with the Vancouver Canucks. ... the messaging I got from the Canucks this morning was that he still needs a few more reps before he's up to regular season speed. So that at least sounds like it's closer to days, maybe inside a week, than it is to a week or more.""
Now you'll have probably noticed we added the caveat of 'in theory', when describing the excellent news for Demko. That's because, even at this point, it's still tough to get too excited about any update when it comes to the NHL two-time All-Star.
Ever since Demko first suffered his injury last season, it's often been a case of him being close to a return. Don't forget that during his exit presser at the conclusion of the 2023-24 campaign, he said he would have been able to play if the Canucks had knocked out the Edmonton Oilers and advanced to the Western Conference Final.
An unusual sporting injury
Now we do appreciate that this was before the full nature of the 28-year-old's injury was known. As was subsequently discovered, a popliteus muscle issue on the back of the knee is an extremely rare sporting injury, particularly for a hockey player.
Along these lines, the Canucks have quite rightly taken an extremely cautious approach to dealing with said injury, effectively leaving it up to Demko to decide when he's ready to return to action. As such, every time there's an encouraging update on his progress, there's an element of frustration because nobody knows when he will be able to play again, except for him.
In fact, Dreger even alluded to this himself during part of his update on TSN. He said:
""When you're coming off a longer-term injury, that's how you gauge the readiness of that individual - whether or not they can get through a couple practices, and how they feel. So he has been participating of late with the Vancouver Canucks in practice, but they don't feel like they're in any rush here.""
Continuing with the theme of being a Debbie downer, even when Demko does finally return, you have the unknown of how he will respond in game action as opposed to practice. Particularly because of the reality we are dealing with the unknown, when it comes to this type of injury.
Throw in the fact that the 2014 second round draft pick has been injury prone in general ever since becoming the Canucks' number one in goal, and there's still plenty to be concerned about. There's no denying a fit and healthy Demko makes the team so much better and more of a genuine contender ... but only if he can stay fit and healthy.