This weekend sees the beginning of a crucial period of the Vancouver Canucks' 2024-25 campaign. That's because they will be embarking on a six-game road trip over 11 days, starting in Ottawa on Sat. Nov. 23 and concluding on Tues. Dec. 3 in Minnesota.
The Canucks are in a decent enough position ahead of Thursday's slate of NHL action, with a record of 9-6-3 and sitting in the final playoff position in the Western Conference. However, they've lost three of their past four games and are missing some important players, including Brock Boeser, J.T. Miller and Derek Forbort.
The Canucks have been fantastic on their travels so far in 2024-25 with a 6-1-0 record, but this form could now be seriously compromised by a weakened roster. With this in mind, the team received a much-needed boost ahead of this weekend's trip to the nation's capital.
A surprise addition on Canucks' road trip
As per Chris Faber of NHL.com, Thatcher Demko is going to be joining the Canucks for their six-game road trip. This is theoretically encouraging news, seeming to allude to him finally being just about ready to play again.
Along this line of thinking, the timing is excellent, when considering Kevin Lankinen's recent drop in effectiveness, along with Artūrs Šilovs just looking poor in general. However, as we wrote Tuesday, it's still tough to get too excited about any Demko updates.
The reality is that there's still a lot of unknowns surrounding a torn popliteus muscle in the knee, particularly with it being such a rare sporting injury. Every time a new deadline has been reported about when Demko will play again, it has subsequently been put on the back-burner.
At the end of the day, the Canucks have admitted it's down to the two-time NHL All-Star, to determine when he's actually ready to play again in a game. And in fairness this is how it should be, with the team reluctant to rush him back and potentially cause the goalie to suffer some kind of setback.
No timeline still despite encouraging progress
From Demko's point of view, he's confident about playing, but admits he still can't say when. Speaking to the media on Wednesday afternoon, he said:
""I definitely know that I’ll be playing here, you know, I can’t give you the timeline yet, but I’ll definitely be back. [I am] just enjoying being where I’m at today and keep making progress.""
Last season's Vezina Trophy finalist made a point of thanking everyone concerned for the support and patience they've shown towards him during his rehab. He said:
""You try not to guilt yourself into tricking yourself that you're maybe farther along just so you can get back sooner, things like that. But my teammates have been great. My coaching staff has been great with just not really putting pressure on me. I think they know that I probably do that enough on my own. And so, they all have been very supportive and that's been huge to this process.""
That Demko is now participating in full practice again does at least represent positive progress, but he's leaving nothing to chance for getting back between the pipes in an actual game. he said:
""I’ve got to put this thing through hell and know that I can sustain that and withstand just the pressures of being in the NHL every day; playing games, waking up, practising and travelling – doing all this stuff. I need to make sure that I'm ready for the long haul.""
Can Demko stay healthy when he DOES return?
The long haul is a key part of those comments, given that Demko has struggled to remain healthy ever-since taking over as the Canucks' number one in net. His talent is beyond question, but it doesn't matter if he keeps getting injured.
As such, this is why we're taking nothing for granted with respect to Demko joining the Canucks for the upcoming six-game road trip. Yes, it is encouraging news but only up to a point, with no guarantees that he will play anytime between Ottawa and Minnesota.
Of course, plenty of Cancucks will be excited about Demko's pending return irrespective of our opinion. As he said:
""I have a little bit of light at the end of the tunnel, for sure, we have a lot of direction in what we're trying to accomplish, we've gotten some huge progress and big jumps over the last probably two, three, four weeks. We're moving in the right direction.""
We wait to see what moving in the right direction means for when Demko will play next. Yes we hope it's soon, but until that moment arrives, we're not going to get carried away.