“We know that he’s a full participant now with the Vancouver Canucks and that bodes well. I mean, his expected return is imminent. I would say sooner rather than later. Again I’m dodging the specific timeline because I don’t think that they [the Canucks] have a specific date in mind or at least one that they’re willing to disclose at this point.

The only indication I was given this morning is that he looks good and they’d like to see him get more reps to get fully up to NHL regular season game speed, but they like what they’re seeing in practice, so it does feel like it’s inside days now.

So how many reps is a number of reps to get him up to full speed? That might be something that just has to be gauged practice by practice, day by day, skate by skate, you know when Demko says ‘yeah, you know what? I’m ready, I feel like I’m good to go’, and he passes the eye test from all involved in that decision making, then he’ll be welcomed back.

And man, isn’t that going to feel like a mega trade for the Vancouver Canucks? I know we want to talk about defence, and you know what’s being speculated, what might be available out there, but if you bring a piece like Thatcher Demko back into the equation, that’s going to feel like a grand slam to Vancouver.”