This team is slightly worse than last year. Scoring and Goaltending is par at best but D is worse with the inexperience of the third pair. Schmidt adds offence but they'll need to score a lot of goals if they're going to be successful.

Everything depends on how Demko plays. If he plays like a legit starter they'll finish 2nd in the division

Behind who?

Yet everyone always puts them at 2nd or 3rd

Goaltending is much worse and scoring has dropped somewhat with the loss of Toffoli and Leivo.

2nd worst?

Best from what ive seen

Leafs unfortunately

Its kinda funny though

oilers finishing first

betta 5 packs of timmies cards

I don't see it. They were like 4th last year and have fallen behind other teams in the offseason.

Edit: 3rd actually, but just fractions ahead of Calgary and Winnipeg.

EDM .585
TOR .579 [-.006]
VCR .565 [-.020]
CGY .564 [-.021]
WPG .563 [-.022]
MTL .500 [-.085]
OTT .437 [-.148]

exactly

Schmidt >>> Tanev. One of Juolevi, Rathbone, Rafferty will take Stecher spot. Also VAN young players gained a lot of experience from the playoffs so they will be better as well. Goaltending might be a concern but Ian Clark can get Holtby back to his old self and Demko should improve as well, Markstrom would not be the goalie he is right now without Clarks help. Losing Toffoli sucks but VAN only had him for 10 games and few playoff games I don't think that's going to be an issue. One concern I have is depth on the blueline and Edlers age.

As an Oilers fan Vancouver is actually the team that scares me the most. The fact that Pettersson is still improving and Hughes has only played 1 season means that your young core should actually get better this season. And I think you guys are going to like Schmidt a lot. Its all up to the goaltending, if one of those 2 has a good season then I don't see how they miss the playoffs tbh

All depends on the kids and the tending, Hughes and petterson prove they are elite, and tending better than avg, they will be top half of the division, lesser tending or slumps and they will be lower. Short season I could see there pp being lethal and some streaking tending could win them the division.

Tough. It's going to be tight. The Jets and Oilers have their deficiencies on D but Montreal and Toronto look better this year. Calgary wins the division in my mind but these four other teams are going to be tough for Van to beat. Ottawa's dead last, I think we can all agree.

Agreed the depths not there so the kids need to take a step and take over games. We'll see, it will definitely be interesting. Can't wait.

As a Canucks fan, I really hope you're right. haha.

Agreed that Schmidt is more dynamic than Tanev. He's an obvious upgrade offensively and will fit in nicely on the second pair. It could work out really well but Tanev did a lot that we won't get from any of these other guys that we have on the back end. I fear that these young guys coming in on the third pair aren't ready to make that next step and be effective. Stecher was a #6 D so hopefully one of these guys coming in can be that or more.

We say this every year but it's going to come down to whether or not they can stay healthy. The depth is not there if they lose key pieces.

You're on, zero chance the Oilers finish 1st with their tandem

Schmidt was deployed by Vegas to play all the hard matchups he is more than capable of playing Tanev role and more. The bottom pairing is a concern but VAN needs to know what they have in Juolevi and the other young guys in order to improve their blueline. Injuries will be a concern for sure but that is going to be for everyone.

Canucks were top 10 in goals throughout the season. Toffoli only played 10 regular season games and was gone for most of the playoffs. He doesnt factor much into their soring. Leivo was injured for more than half the season as ell so he also doesnt play a big part.

If anything canucks will score more since the forwards havent changed much which means more chemistry and the arrival of highly touted prospects, hoglander and podkolzin later on.

Vancouver probably has an average offense for the division. Their defense isn't special and their goaltending is well below average. Here are each team's top-9 coupled with last year's scoring rates (points per game):

Edmonton: 7.69 total
Draisaitl: 1.55 P/GP
McDavid: 1.52
Yamamoto: 0.96
Nugent-Hopkins: 0.94
Kassian: 0.58
Neal: 0.56
Kahun: 0.55
Ennis: 0.53
Turris: 0.50

Toronto: 6.72 total
Matthews: 1.14 P/GP
Marner: 1.14
Tavares: 0.95
Nylander: 0.87
Hyman: 0.73
Mikheyev: 0.59
Thornton: 0.44
Kerfoot: 0.43
Spezza: 0.43

Winnipeg: 6.40 total
Connor: 1.03 P/GP
Scheifele: 1.03
Laine: 0.93
Wheeler: 0.92
Ehlers: 0.82
Stastny: 0.54
Roslovic: 0.41
Copp: 0.41
Perreault: 0.31

Vancouver: 6.05 total
Miller: 1.04 P/GP
Pettersson: 0.97
Boeser: 0.79
Horvat: 0.77
Pearson: 0.65
Gaudette: 0.56
Virtanen: 0.52
Sutter: 0.39
Ferland: 0.36

Calgary: 5.60 total
Tkachuk: 0.88 P/GP
Gaudreau: 0.83
Lindholm: 0.77
Monahan: 0.69
Backlund: 0.64
Leivo: 0.53
Mangiapane: 0.47
Ryan: 0.43
Dube: 0.36

Montreal: 5.33 total
Tatar: 0.90 P/GP
Gallagher: 0.73
Danault: 0.66
Tofolli: 0.65
Suzuki: 0.58
Drouin: 0.56
Armia: 0.52
Lehkonen: 0.39
Byron: 0.34

Ottawa: 4.42 total
Dadonov: 0.68 P/GP
Tkachuk: 0.62
Brown: 0.61
Tierney: 0.52
Batherson: 0.43
Galchenyuk: 0.41
Anisimov: 0.41
White: 0.38
Paul: 0.36

Tell me about it lol. Canucks finally play a good team and get exposed for the trash team they are. I will officially be taking my fan hood to Vancouver where they know how to run a real dynasty.

Did you think it would be this bad?