A New Era of Canucks Hockey Is Upon Us

Former Canucks head coach Travis Green (left) and former Canucks GM Jim Benning (right) (Dan Toulgoet / Glacier Media)

I can't stress enough how much the Canucks looked like a playoff team on paper before the season began. The playoffs were expected because they had a young corps of talented players, made a big trade with the Arizona Coyotes to acquire two solid contributors, and resigned their two best players in Quinn Hughes and Elias Pettersson. This busy offseason was brought about because general manager Jim Benning was on the hot seat, and he was making last-ditch efforts to keep his job--the results of his actions were not desirable to the Aquilini family, however. Through 25 games, the Canucks have gone 8-15-2--which is good for last place in the Pacific Division.

Now that their beloved team was failing, the fans continued to plea to ownership to remove Jim Benning from his role as the Canucks general manager--but Benning was not the only person the fans wanted to go. Travis Green was failing as the Canucks head coach--and it wasn't pretty. Coach Green was always well known for being stoic and calm while also reaching his players. Sure, some of his relationships with his players weren't ideal. Still, he managed to be professional about it--his relationship with Loui Eriksson is a decent example of this. Though Green has been well-liked by fans and players alike, the coveted results of a winning team weren't showing.

Coach Green came to the Canucks as the replacement to Willie Desjardins in 2017. He had success as the head coach of the former Canucks farm team, the Utica Comets. He was brought in for the job because of his success as a head coach in the minors and because the players he coached said he was player-friendly--and that was a true statement. Once Coach Green came to Vancouver, I saw a significant change in their conduct. They began to play together as a team, build on their chemistry, and they looked like they were even having fun on the ice. In my mind, Green was an immediate upgrade over Desjardins, but that was all he did.

Travis Green with Elias Pettersson (40) and Alex Chiasson (39) (THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck)

The Canucks were playing like a better team, but they still weren't winning games. The reason why Canucks fans tolerated Green's first year was that the team chemistry increased, and we had Elias Pettersson and Quinn Hughes to look forward to. Once Pettersson and Hughes joined the team and JT Miller, the team began to win games. However, outside of the Bubble in 2020, the Canucks failed to find consistency in winning. They were one of the worst teams in the Scotia Northern Division last year--which was the worst division in 2020--, and many wrote the Canucks off as underperformers. Today, the Canucks are still underperforming and struggling to score goals. Many people pointed the accusatory finger at Travis Green because of his habit of shaking up the lines and defensive pairings. Green was never scared to pair different players together to see how strong they performed, but the gag got old. Fans want consistency in the top lines, but Green would always change it up to get a spark--and many times, nothing came of it. Now, Travis Green has been relieved of his duties as the Vancouver Canucks head coach, and his replacement is a name that hockey fans are all too familiar with--Bruce Boudreau.

The hiring of Bruce Boudreau as the new head coach of the Canucks is enticing. Boudreau has made a name for himself, coaching quality hockey teams in the past. In the late 2000s, he was the coach for the Washington Capitals and had plenty of success. However, his success came mainly in the regular season as the Capitals fell short of expectations Boudreau as a head coach every year. After his time in Washington, he took his talents to Southern California to coach the Anaheim Ducks. He coached the Anaheim Ducks for four years and won the Pacific Division every year. However, his mastery of falling up short in the postseason continued as the Ducks failed to meet expecations--I'm starting to see a pattern here, are you? Boudreau's time with the Minnesota Wild was underwhelming as the Wild were nothing more than a decent team during his tenure there--not reassuring.

Newly hired Canucks head coach Bruce Boudreau with the Minnesota Wild (Brace Hemmelgarn-USA TODAY Sports)

Though Bruce Boudreau may have fallen short of expectations almost every year, he still coaches quality teams to some levels of success. As of right now, the Canucks are in desperate need of a boost, and Boudreau can bring that. Travis Green was a player's coach, and Boudreau is well known for being player-friendly and getting the most out of his players--and the Canucks need that right now. Canucks captain Bo Horvat spoke on the hiring of Boudreau saying, “Our team needed a spark”.—-that’s a nice way of putting it, Bo.

With Jim Benning and Travis Green now gone, it's obvious the Aquilinis are trying to erase the memory of the Benning era of Canucks history. Though I do wish they didn't look so desperate doing it. They replaced Jim Benning with legendary Canucks captain Stan Smyl as their interim general manager--the rumor is the Canucks are looking into hiring former Canadiens' general manager Marc Bergevin to fill Jimbo's role. It's interesting to see what Stan Smyl does in his time as general manager--my guess is he won't do much.

The Canucks are now looking to the future with a new head coach and temporary general manager at the helm. Will Boudreau be able to come in and get the team on course to the playoffs? Most likely not. But, that's not what the major takeaway of this endeavor is. The main takeaway is that the Canucks finally moved off of an incompetent general manager and a spiraling head coach. That being said, they did do a lot for this team, whether fans are willing to admit it. So, I say thank you to those two men for what they have done for the Canucks--mainly the 2020 postseason run. Now, it's time to look to the future and the new Bruce Boudreau era of Canucks hockey. Hopefully, coach Boudreau can get the most out of these players. If not, another long rebuild is waiting on the horizon.