Toronto Maple Leafs: How the Canucks Stack Up in Canadian Division
There’s a chance the Toronto Maple Leafs play in an all Canadian division
The COVID-19 pandemic is still running wild in the world we live in today. It has shutdown the United States-Canada border for unessential travel which includes professional sports of all kinds.
Since this is the case, if the National Hockey League does indeed end up having a season, there’s a strong chance that the Toronto Maple Leafs and all the other Canadian based teams will be placed in one division to prevent having to cross the border.
If the all Canadian division does end up happening, one of the teams the Maple Leafs will have to often face is the Vancouver Canucks.
Leafs/Canucks all time history
The Toronto Maple Leafs and Canucks have played each other a grand total of 153 different times with Vancouver having the slight advantage with an all-time record of 69-62-22. The first time these two teams faced off was back in 1971 where they split the series 3-3.
Despite the Canucks having the slightly better record, the all time series could go either way. Back in the olden days, ties were able to occur without declaring a winner at the end of the game, hence the total of 22 ties between the two teams, but this was eliminated in 2005 when the league implemented the shootout. If shootouts were a thing well before 2005, the record between the Leafs and Canucks would be a lot different.
While the Toronto Maple Leafs and Canucks play in separate conferences now, these two teams did cross paths in the playoffs in 1994 in the conference finals. The Canucks came away with the series win sweeping the Leafs in four games.
Canucks 2019-20 season
As the pandemic put a hiatus on the 2019-20 NHL season, all teams played less than the original anticipated schedule of 82 games. Last season, the Canucks played a total of 69 games going 36-27-6 and got 78 points.
They finished fourth in the Pacific Division and were a point back of the third place Calgary Flames. They finished the regular season with a positive goal differential of 11.
J.T. Miller, who the Canucks gave up a first-round pick for prior to the start of the season, led the team in points with a total of 72. Miller tied with Elias Pettersson for the team lead in goals with 27, and he also tied Quinn Hughes with the most assists with 45. Miller and Hughes also tied in powerplay points with 25 although the former had more of his powerplay points come via goals.
Alexander Edler got the most penalty minutes of all Canucks players spending a total of 62 minutes in the box. Jake Virtanen had the most game winning goals with six and Bo Horvat led the Canucks in shots with 178.
Pettersson had the best shot percentage of 16.7% with Miler coming a close second with 16.4%. Miller also had the highest faceoff percentage as he won faceoffs at a rate of 59.2%. (stats hockeyreference.com).
Jacob Markstrom, their starting goalie, started 43 games going 23-16-4 with a GAA of 2.75 and a save percentage of .918.
Playoffs
The Canucks were included as part of the 24 team return to play bracket where as the seventh seed, they faced the Minnesota Wild (10th seed) in the qualifying round.
In the best-of-five series, the Canucks won 3-1 and moved onto the first round of the playoffs. While they got shutout the first game by a score of 3-0, the Canucks rallied back to win three straight games which included Christopher Tanev’s overtime game winning goal 11 seconds in to send the Canucks onto the next round.
They were set up to face the reigning Stanley Cup champions in the St. Louis Blues as they finished last in the exhibition round to determine the seeding among the top teams for the first round of the playoffs.
They won games one, two, five and six to upset the Blues in six games, taking the series 4-2 to move onto the second round of the playoffs.
After their first-round win, they were set to take on the first seeded team in the Western Conference in the Las Vegas Golden Knights. Despite the Canucks being the fifth seeded team, they proved to be a challenge for Vegas as they came back from a 3-1 deficit to force a game seven but ultimately lost.
The biggest problem for the Canucks was not being able to score goals in the games they lost as they were shutout by the Golden Knights in all their losses in that round.
Departures
The Canucks had quite a few players walk away from the team in free agency.
The one that probably hurts the most is the departure of Tyler Toffoli who they acquired from the Los Angeles Kings at the trade deadline where they gave up a second round pick and a prospect.
He only played 10 regulation games with the Canucks last season but got as many points in as many games while also making solid contributions during the playoffs. He left to sign with a different Canadian team in the Montreal Canadiens for four years and $17 million.
The Canucks blue line also got hit from the departures as they were unable to retain Tanev. He played in every single game for the Canucks last season recording 20 points (two goals and 18 assists) and blocking 159 shots (hockeyreference.com). If the all Canadian division happens, the Canucks (and Toronto Maple Leafs) will be seeing Tanev often as he went onto sign with the Flames for four years and $18 million.
While not as hurtful as the departure of Tanev, Troy Stecher is no longer on the Canucks which hurts their defensive depth. Like Tanev, he appeared in all 69 games last season scoring five goals and helping on 12 of them. He went on to sign with the Detroit Red Wings for two years and $3.4 million.
Their starting goalie in Markstrom also left the team but they were able to find a capable replacement (more on that in the next slide). He will be joining Tanev in Calgary on a six year, $36 million deal.
Notable additions and signings
The biggest signing the Canucks made this past offseason is bringing in Braden Holtby. Last season with the Washington Capitals, he went 25-14-6 with a career-worst GAA of 3.11 and save percentage of .897. This was the first time in his career that he’s posted a GAA of over 3.00 and a save percentage of under .900. Holtby was signed to a two year contract worth $8.6 million.
That was their only notable signing where a new player was brought to the team. They did bring in some new guys in players like Zack MacEwen, Jayce Hawryluk and Ashton Sautner but those three have a combined 112 games at the NHL level under their belt.
The Canucks did make one trade where they acquired Nate Schmidt from the Golden Knights in exchange for a third round pick in the 2022 draft. In 59 games last season, he tallied 31 points which came in the form of seven goals and 24 assists. He’s under contract for $5.95 million a year until the 2024-25 season.
The Canucks doled out contract extensions at the NHL level to two of their players in Adam Gaudette (one year, $950,000) and Virtanen (two years, $5.1 million).
It’s safe to say that the Canucks came out as losers this offseason as they lost significant more talent than they added.
How do the Canucks compare to the Toronto Maple Leafs?
The Canucks and Leafs are a few years apart in regards to how their teams are structured and Toronto is the team that’s further ahead.
Prior to the Leafs getting the likes of Auston Matthews, Mitch Marner and William Nylander via the draft, they were a bottom feeding team that went through a tough phase. They piled up on draft picks from their rebuilding years and built the team into the contender they are today.
It wasn’t too long ago that the Canucks were at the bottom of the standings as well. They used their high draft picks on the likes of Pettersson, Hughes, Horvat and others to turn themselves in a better position to contend.
The Leafs are clearly more loaded up front than the Canucks are but this goes towards comparing Toronto’s forward depth to any team. Having a forward group that consists of Matthews, Marner, Nylander, John Tavares and many others is hard to compete with.
On the blue line, the Canucks have a great balance with a playmaker in Hughes, veteran presence in Edler, grit/toughness in Jordie Benn with Tyler Myers, Schmidt and a young defenseman in 21-year-old Jack Rathbone to round it out.
The Toronto Maple Leafs really revamped their blue line this offseason by bringing in T.J. Brodie and Zach Bogosian and that’s without mentioning Jake Muzzin, Morgan Rielly and Travis Dermott.
The edge goes to the Leafs on the defensive corps but the Canucks have put together a solid core on the defensive side of the puck.
Until Holtby can show that he can go back to his superstar form, Frederik Andersen is the better goalie but the Canucks do have an intriguing young backup netminder in Thatcher Demko.
Next. Leafs Top 10 Prospects. dark
The Toronto Maple Leafs are better but the Canucks are not a team that should be taken lightly.