3 reasons the Vancouver Canucks can defeat the Wild
3. Scoring Depth
Sure, having stars is important. But at the end of the day, you’ve also got to have some impressive depth to make a long postseason run. This trend became highlighted with the 2015-16 Pittsburgh Penguins with their three lines of scoring, but it’s been happening for a while.
They had five players with at least 20 goals this season (Pettersson, J.T Miller, Bo Horvat, Tanner Pearson, Bo Horvat, and Tyler Toffoli). Only two other teams, the Florida Panthers and the Winnipeg Jets, can boast that.
On top of that, the Canucks had two more players on pace for 20 goals. Jake Virtanen has 18 goals in 69 games while Boeser has 16 goals in 57 games. You’re not going to find many teams who have that many good goal scorers.
Even once you look past those guys, they have players like Adam Gaudette, Josh Leivo, and Brandon Sutter as options in the bottom six. You’d like to see them have one more proven goal scorer there, but their top six is good enough that it’ll probably make do.
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The Canucks are probably a year away from being serious Stanley Cup contenders. They’ve got to find more goal scorers. But don’t overlook them this season. They’re the kind of team who could get hot at the right time and they’re more well-balanced than a lot of people think.