Now that you’ve gotten over the “understatement of the year” portion of this article, let’s take a look at what we took away from the first day of Vancouver Canucks training camp – in terms of their lineup While it’s usually unwise to discard a full lineup after just one day of practice, Boudreau told reporters Wednesday that the philosophy of training camp is a little different than what Canucks fans are used to. After years of being told not to read line rushes – even on game days – by former Canucks head coach Travis Green, Boudreau was candid in stating that he would draw lines in training camp that he felt could play together in the regular season. Advertisement – Continue Reading Below “At practice tomorrow we’re going to have at least four series that we hope are similar to opening night,” Boudreau said. “But the next day they might all change, so who knows.” “The hard part will be Sunday because we have to put two teams and X number of veterans together in each game. But in the preseason, at least for the first couple of games, the lines that we have out there, we’re going to try to keep together as a unit. Instead of saying, “Okay, JT, you’re playing, but Boeser’s not playing, so we’re going to put someone else in.” I try to keep the lines together to maintain some familiarity with them.” “For example, in Penticton, there was a line of Wouters, Klimovich and Nielsen and they played well together. So why not keep them together here? So we will do it.” With all that in mind, let’s dive into what lines we saw on the ice today in Whistler, in the best possible order. Advertisement – Continue Reading Below Here is the current lineup of NHL promotion lines: 1st row: Tanner Pearson – JT Miller – Brock Boeser 2nd row: Conor Garland – Bo Horvat – Vasily Podkolzin 3rd row: Andrey Kuzmenko – Elias Pettersson – Ilya Mikheyev 4th Row: Dakota Joshua – Jason Dickinson – Curtis Lazar The most impressive thing from the forward lines is that Nils Höglander is currently on the outside looking in when it comes to the NHL forward group. Advertisement – Continue Reading Below We’re not sure how much we should be reading into the lines on AHL skaters as to how likely we are to see those lines in Abbotsford on opening night, but we can tell you that Höglander skated with Nils Åman and O Linus Karlsson for what could very well be a top six forward line – if not the top line overall – in Abbotsford this season. The organization believes in both Karlsson and Åman and will want both players to make major strides in their development this season in Abbotsford, and it’s likely they want the same for Höglander. Granted, it’s a little more difficult to point to the defense pairings and try to name any of them as the NHL’s first, second, and third pairings, but here’s what we saw today: Oliver Ekman-Larsson – Quinn Hughes Danny DeKeyser – Tyler Myers Jack Rathbone – Luke Schenn Advertisement – Continue Reading Below Travis Dermott – Tucker Poolman Quinn Hughes was stuck on the right side today, and likely will be for the foreseeable future as the Canucks continue to see what they have in Hughes on the opposite side. Danny DeKeyser, who joined the Canucks on a PTO, looked fine next to Tyler Myers in the game. He made simple passes and didn’t try to do anything too fancy. DeKeyser missed a wide-open net after a sweet feed from Elias Pettersson during the game, which certainly wasn’t the best performance, but overall, DeKeyser looked fine today. The Canucks are clearly hoping that Jack Rathbone can find success like Quinn Hughes playing alongside Luke Schenn. Rathbone obviously isn’t as talented as Hughes, but he has to be the main driver in any pairing he plays, and Shen is certainly no stranger to playing with a partner where that happens. All in all, it’s very likely that this will be the Canucks’ opening night lineup, but it’s more likely that we’ll see some new line combinations experimented with as training camp and the preseason continue. Advertisement – Continue Reading Below Boudreau hinted that he has limitless line-up possibilities in his head, after all. When asked how many different line combinations he has in mind, the coach had a somewhat nondescript answer. “How high a number can you think of?” “The only thing I really know is we want to start with Bo, Petey and JT in the middle. Everybody else, we’ve had lineups where they play left and right,” Boudreau said of the team’s forward depth. “I talk to all of them about how they like to play or if I’m going to take them to a different spot.” See you tomorrow, Canucks fans! Advertisement – Continue Reading Below
