The Vancouver Canucks 2016-17 season is very nearly at an end: tonight is the final night. A rematch against the Edmonton Oilers, with plenty still on the line for both clubs.

The Oilers want another win, as they’re two points off of tying Anaheim for the division lead – a win tonight could allow a Battle of Alberta in the first round. Hell yeah.

The Canucks, whether they want to admit it or not, need an outright loss to stay in 29th place. Remember folks, this is as much about how far you can fall as it is about the likelihood of rising or staying in the top two. 29th means you can go no further down than 5th (hello Casey Mittelstadt!), while a win tonight could put them in 27th, where they could fall as far as 8th (hello.. Michael Rasmussen? Dear God).

The Canucks, for their part, have demonstrated their dedication to the tank by putting in a call to get Yan-Pavel Laplante, fresh out of the ECHL, allegedly to play against the Oilers tonight in the season finale. Crafty move, Benning.

The move has yet to be announced by the Canucks, but was revealed this morning by his agent.

There are plenty of angles from which to view this move:

One angle from which this does not make sense is from a hockey playing angle.

Laplante was shuttled between the ECHL and AHL this season, although it was clear that he was preferred to be left in the former league. His entire 2016-17 season breaks down like this:

Laplante last played in the AHL on December 31st – though he remained on the Comets roster until January 26th. In those 13 games that he played, he managed a single point, an assist on December 30th.

During his time in the East Coast league, he scored nine goals and produced a total of 20 points, for a rate of just over a half-point per game. That scoring rate places him eighth among Alaska Aces regulars this season.

The Canucks played yet another game last night with 11 forwards, so it’s likely that this falls under the realm of an emergency call up. Laplante was the only forward on the ECHL roster who the Canucks had on an NHL contract. Mackenze Stewart (remember that totally appropriate use of an NHL contract?!) was there as well, but he has been back on defence this season.

The Canucks seem intent on giving as many young players as possible NHL debuts this season, whether they’ve truly earned the opportunity or not. I suppose I should be taking it easy on a guy who could be realizing his dream tonight, lest we get in trouble from Dan Murphy again, but I mean, come on. The Canucks have this habit of forcing me to be extremely critical of people that I assume are perfectly nice and just trying their best.

This has to be a bit of a slap in the face to some Comets players, particularly those other forwards who have yet to make their NHL debuts, like Cole Cassels and Michael Carcone. But, as the tale goes, the Comets are in the midst of a playoff push. They’re one point back of the final playoff spot with a game in hand – and they’ll at noon today against the team they’re chasing, making it one of the most important matches of their season. So it’s understandable why they wouldn’t want to disrupt that lineup. Even though both Cassels and Carcone have seen their share of healthy scratches this season (particularly Carcone), both are fixtures in the lineup at this point.

The one remaining question is – why wouldn’t the Canucks just play another game with a defender up in the forward ranks, for the bazillionth time this season? I could see a scenario where the Stecher sits out after taking that stick to the face last night, and Biega moves back to defence – even though Philip Larsen is still sitting around doing nothing. There is close to zero chance that Yan-Pavel Laplante is even capable of keeping up at the NHL level, let alone helping the Canucks win a game.

Which leads me to only one logical conclusion.

Tank on, Canucks. Tank on.