Nobody was happy with the Vancouver Canucks’ start to the season.
Not the players, not the coaching staff, and certainly not the fans.
Unsurprisingly, the Canucks’ upper management were also part of that crew.
On Saturday night’s 32 Thoughs segment on Hockey Night in Canada, Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman dropped the following nugget:
“Well obviously they started 0-5-2 and nobody there was in a really good headspace at all. The last 48 hours they had back-to-back wins, and everybody feeling a little bit better. But I think one of the storylines that came out of this was that the Vancouver Canucks made it very clear to some of their players that if there were changes made, they wouldn’t just be potentially the head coach.“I heard what they told some players [was] this: ‘We’ve had two coaches now with this group and it isn’t working so far, so if anybody who thinks that we’re going to sit back and wait and say, ‘Okay, that’s going to be the change we’re going to make’, you might be mistaken, and the changes might be with the roster.“I think the players got that message loud and clear. We’ll see where this goes. It’s two big wins in 24 hours, but like I said, they made it very clear to the players that there would be changes on the roster too if things continue.”
The Canucks got off to a historically bad start to their season, becoming the first team in NHL history to lose the first four games of their season while blowing multi-goal leads in each.
With their Thursday night win in Seattle and Friday’s 5-1 home victory over the Pittsburgh Penguins, the Canucks are no longer the 32nd-place team in the National Hockey League.
The Canucks are back in action on Tuesday, when they will take on the New Jersey Devils at home.