The Vancouver Canucks ended the month of October with a thud.
On Wednesday night, Vancouver suffered its worst loss of the season. It was a lopsided 6-0 shellacking at the hands of the New Jersey Devils on home ice, a loss that illuminated some of the most frustrating elements of Vancouver’s team game through its first nine games of the season.
As ugly as the loss to the Devils was earlier this week, on the whole, the Canucks will end October in a good spot overall. For all of the various sources of local frustrating — a disappointing first month from the club’s marquee UFA signing Jake DeBrusk, Elias Pettersson’s struggles, Thatcher Demko’s continued indefinite absence — the Canucks have still racked up a .611 point percentage. This start has positioned the Canucks well to take a serious run at repeating as Pacific Division winners.
As the calendar flips to November, let’s look at some of the individual component parts that have contributed to Vancouver’s results over the first month of the campaign. We graded every Canucks forwards’ October on Thursday, today let’s proceed with a look at every defender and goaltender on the roster.
Quinn Hughes: A
2024-25 statistics: 9 GP, 2-6-8
Hughes has been by far the Canucks’ most valuable skater this season. He isn’t piling up video-game-like point totals, but his gargantuan impact on the flow of play has almost single-handedly kept the Canucks afloat. Vancouver has outshot opponents by 47, controlled a whopping 65 percent of expected goals and outscored opponents 10-4 with Hughes on the ice at five-on-five. In non-Hughes five-on-five minutes, the Canucks are getting their teeth kicked in when it comes to the shot clock and scoring chance battle, which has led to a minus-6 goal differential.
Vancouver’s captain is averaging the most even-strength minutes per game of all NHL players. He’s doing his usual magic on the breakout and in the offensive zone, which includes leading the team in shots on goal by a mile. He’s also driving elite defensive metrics — he ranks top 20 among all defencemen for suppressing shots and expected goals against per hour, including a sparkling 1.35 goals-against per hour rate at five-on-five.
The elite point totals will return if and when the power play gets back on track, but one could argue that Hughes’ even-strength play has actually been better than it was last season when he won the Norris Trophy. Hughes is proving that last year’s breakout to true superstar status was no fluke. Now, he just needs some of his teammates to step up so he isn’t just a one-man show on the back end.
Filip Hronek: B-plus
2024-25 statistics: 9 GP, 0-2-2
Hronek has continued to be a perfect fit on Hughes’ right side, and intermittently has shown signs of being less deferential on Vancouver’s dominant top pair.
While much of Hronek’s value is tied up in how well he complements Hughes at the top of the lineup, he’s also become a first-choice penalty killing option and has fared very well in four-on-five situations.
While Hronek remains one of Vancouver’s key star-level performers and has been a crucial contributor to the club’s single greatest source of strength — the play of its top pair — there are some concerns under the hood through nine games. In particular, Hronek’s shot and shot attempt rate have fallen significantly in comparison with last season, an indicator that being a more assertive part of his pair with Hughes is still a work in progress.
Carson Soucy: D
2024-25 statistics: 9 GP, 0-0-0
Soucy’s surprisingly miserable start has poured gasoline on the fire surrounding Vancouver’s bottom-four defence. Last year, he was a dependable second-pair shutdown presence. He shined defensively because of his IQ, long stick and positioning, and he was just poised enough with the puck for his work on the breakout not to be an issue.
This year, he has some of the worst two-way metrics of all NHL top-four defencemen in the early going: Vancouver has been outshot 81-33, controlled just 33.2 percent of expected goals and been outscored 10-3 during his five-on-five shifts.
Soucy is facing major challenges trying to break the puck out. Almost every time the puck is dumped into his corner, it seems like a foregone conclusion that the opposition’s forecheck will find a way to hem his pairing in. This is forcing them to defend on nearly every shift. Making matters worse is that Soucy’s making uncharacteristic defensive mistakes. He’s occasionally losing coverage, box outs and isn’t doing enough to proactively kill the opposition’s cycle and help the Canucks regain puck possession.
Vancouver needs a lot more from Soucy than he’s shown so far.
Tyler Myers: C-minus
2024-25 statistics: 9 GP, 0-2-2
Myers’ pair with Soucy has been a sore spot for Vancouver, as the duo is struggling enormously to get out of their own end regularly enough.
The numbers are stark. With Myers on the ice, Vancouver has been outshot 70-53 at five-on-five and has been outscored by two-to-one (10 goals against, five goals four) in his 140 even-strength minutes. The second pair’s contributions, frankly, have been harmful, although at least in Myers’ case he’s out-performing his most regular partner from an underlying perspective.
It’s worth noting too that while Myers’ gaffes have been loud — he certainly had a miserable outing against the Devils on Wednesday — at least some of his struggles are due to unfortunate bounces. With Myers on the ice at five-on-five, for example, Vancouver’s goaltenders have managed a .853 save percentage. As that number normalizes, the goals against that have poured in against Vancouver’s second pair should slow down somewhat.
While Myers’ five-on-five struggles have been pronounced, he’s been one of the club’s three most frequently used penalty killing defenders and has been reliably solid in short-handed situations.
Erik Brännström: B-plus
2024-25 statistics: 6 GP, 0-1-1
Acquired as a throw-in to the salary cap-motivated Tucker Poolman deal, Brännström deserves a ton of credit for carving himself out a regular spot in the Vancouver lineup over the past month.
Waived and assigned to Abbotsford immediately upon being acquired, Brännström thoroughly dominated two AHL games and was promptly recalled due to Derek Forbort’s absence from the team attending to his father’s death. Brännström’s impact was felt immediately, and it’s already difficult to see how the Canucks blue line would function without his puck-moving presence in the lineup.
Because of Brännström’s ability to retrieve the puck smoothly on dump-ins, escape the Vancouver zone cleanly — either with possession or with clever outlet passes — and his occasional flashes of dynamic play in the offensive zone, Vancouver has consistently been able to outshoot its opponents with Brännström on the ice at five-on-five. He’s the only defender you could say that about in October, outside of Hughes and Hronek.
Beyond the underlying numbers, which are impressive, Vancouver is outscoring its opponents 5-2 with Brännström on the ice at even strength, and he’s helped to stabilize Vincent Desharnais in their shared minutes as a pair.
In record time, Brännström has gone from an afterthought to an essential contributor for the Canucks. That’s a testament to the way he’s seized an opportunity and filled a crucial need for Vancouver over the past month.
Vincent Desharnais: C-minus
2024-25 statistics: 6 GP, 0-1-1
It took just one game for the Canucks to park their $2 million signing in the press box as a healthy scratch. That alone speaks volumes about Desharnais’ challenging transition to Vancouver.
Desharnais’ lack of foot speed is a weakness, he’s unreliable on the breakout and he’s already made a few glaring defensive mistakes that have cost the team. His underlying numbers are surprisingly fine — the Canucks have controlled about 50 percent of shots and scoring chances during his five-on-five shifts — but that’s only because of how effectively Brännström carried him as a partner.
Desharnais had a brutal game against Carolina — he turned the puck over on the Hurricanes’ first goal and made a bad pinch on their second goal — which led to another healthy scratch against New Jersey. He was serviceable on Edmonton’s third pair last season, so it’s too early to completely write him off, but right now he doesn’t look any better than Noah Juulsen, which is concerning because he counts for nearly triple the price against the salary cap.
Noah Juulsen: C-plus
2024-25 statistics: 3 GP, 0-0-0
Juulsen has only been an intermittent contributor in the first month of this season. While he’s performed decently in those minutes, he has a tendency to struggle when out on the ice against top competition, with a tough head-to-head against Nikita Kucherov standing out in the mind. His shot rate is also far too high for a defender with his profile and is quietly a sign of suboptimal offensive decision making.
Provided that Juulsen’s minutes are managed somewhat carefully, he brings some physicality and speed on the back end. He’s also a solid penalty killer and has fared well four-on-five when he’s been in the lineup.
Derek Forbort: n/a
2024-25 statistics: 3 GP, 0-1-1
Forbort’s first month with the Canucks was cut short by a family tragedy — the death of his father — which necessitated a multi-week absence from the club for personal reasons.
Forbort has only appeared in three games, and has yet to appear in a game with Brännström — who could play on Forbort’s right side when the veteran defender returns to the lineup — which makes his on-ice splits a bit more difficult to decipher. So far in Forbort’s ice time, he’s looked like the sturdy defensive option he’s been consistently throughout his career, but on a pair with Juulsen and Desharnais, there hasn’t been enough puck moving to make the third pair really work.
We’ll give him an incomplete grade for now, and be curious to see how he performs when he’s given a look on a third pair with Brännström.
Kevin Lankinen was excellent for Vancouver in October. (Bob Frid / Imagn Images)
Kevin Lankinen: A
2024-25 statistics: 4-0-2, .920 SV%
Can you imagine what the Canucks’ goaltending situation and overall record would be if another team had signed Lankinen in free agency?
Lankinen has been lights out as the club’s de facto starter. He’s pitched a .920 save percentage across six games and has yet to lose a game in regulation. Lankinen’s movement in the crease has looked calm, controlled and poised. He’s tracking the puck exceptionally well, is technically sound and controls rebounds. He even flashed some incredible athleticism and side-to-side power during his last start where he held the fort down against the Hurricanes’ barrage of Grade-A rush scoring chances. Lankinen is the only reason they were able to come back in that game and pick up a point at the end of regulation.
It’d be one thing if he was putting up sparkling numbers playing behind a stingy defensive structure, but the Canucks haven’t defended nearly as well as they did last year. Their defensive depth has been problematic and they’ve leaked many odd-man rushes against — he’s driving these strong results in a more chaotic defensive environment than expected.
Artūrs Šilovs: D-minus
2024-25 statistics: 0-2-1, .797 SV%
Three games is a tiny sample, which is why we didn’t give Šilovs an “F” grade, but it’s been all downhill for him since being tabbed as the Canucks’ opening-night starter.
Šilovs surrendered six goals on 26 shots against the Flames, which continued a concerning trend where he’s been beaten by long-distance shots, especially with traffic in front. He had a respectable bounce-back outing against the Lightning. Sure, the Canucks lost that game, and Brayden Point’s second-period goal was a little bit soft, but Vancouver was utterly dominated for most of that night, especially in the first period where he made a series of marvellous saves to keep the contest close.
However, Šilovs followed it up with a rough performance against New Jersey. He got lit up for six goals on 22 shots. The Canucks were porous defensively off the rush in that game — he was left out to dry at times — but he also needed to make more stops. He was slow to react on the last two goals, in particular.
It could be a while before Šilovs is trusted with another start because the club doesn’t have any back-to-back games until the last week of November.
(Photo of Filip Hronek and Quinn Hughes: Bob Frid / Imagn Images)
