After a less-than-stellar season last year, Vancouver Canucks forward Elias Pettersson is out for “revenge” this upcoming season. Speaking with NHL.com’s Peter Ekholm, Pettersson appears to be on a mission after producing just 15 goals and 45 points last season.
“I know what I’m capable of. Actually, I haven’t thought about it, but for myself it’s revenge. I’m not happy with last season,” he said.
Pettersson, 26, produced nearly half as many points as he did in the 2023–24 season, when he recorded 34 goals and 89 points. After posting three consecutive 30-goal seasons, Pettersson fought through injuries last year, which resulted in him appearing in just 65 games. To address this, Pettersson said he has added muscle to his listed 176-pound frame, noting that the added strength will not only help keep him healthy but also make him faster.
“It’s always about building your base strength, to get quicker on the ice. To gain a few pounds, get stronger in general, that’s always the goal. But for me it’s a bonus to gain a few pounds,” he said.
Elsewhere around the league:
- As a part of a summer Talent Tiers series, TSN’s Travis Yost examined the league’s goaltending depth charts and ranked all 32 teams into five categories, from Tier 1 through Tier 5. Only three teams were included in Yost’s top tier: the New York Rangers, New York Islanders, and Winnipeg Jets. The Islanders were added to the top tier thanks to the combination of veterans Ilya Sorokin and Semyon Varlamov, while the division rival Rangers made it thanks to former Vezina Trophy winner Igor Shesterkin and veteran backup Jonathan Quick. For Winnipeg, the play of Connor Hellebuyck — and his three Vezina Trophies — is enough to lift the team into Tier 1. On the other hand, four teams were placed in Yost’s Tier 5: the Buffalo Sabres, Columbus Blue Jackets, Philadelphia Flyers, and Pittsburgh Penguins.
- The Athletic’s Dom Luszczyszyn recently took a look at every player’s market value over the remainder of their contracts to determine which team is spending money the most efficiently. In his view, three teams earned an “A+” rating in this category: the Tampa Bay Lightning, Carolina Hurricanes, and Colorado Avalanche. Notably, the back-to-back champion Florida Panthers rank fourth in Luszczyszyn’s latest rankings, while the Edmonton Oilers dropped from second last year to eighth this season. On the flip side of the coin, three teams achieved a league-low “D+” rating: the Nashville Predators, Chicago Blackhawks, and Seattle Kraken.
A D+ is rather charitable for GM Trotz at this point.
@Gbear — Ouch. Harsh, but true. He is struggling mightily at his job, and I feel for him. I could envision Hextall’s successors taking over the reins and saying, “I know I can do it better than he did.” With GMBT, though, I don’t think he’s wired that way, but it seems he hasn’t mastered being able to alternately put on a coach’s hat then a GM hat to better understand the team’s strengths and weaknesses. Since it seems he’s determined to keep Bruno, maybe some helpful hints about changing systems might work. They both need to work together, not against each other, thgouh.
@Mac – Trotz seemed to at least have picked a direction he wanted to go in last off-season, but he’s changed horses in the middle of the stream so many times now that it appears he lost his compass. This season could really get ugly. And as much as I don’t like Bruno as coach, he’ll likely be the first causulty of this bad roster construction.
Errata! “thgouh”??? My LanguageTool extension is crapping things up with AI-Slop. 👺
I usually don’t catch my own spelling mistakes let alone others, lol!
@Gbear — This is a tool, that was pretty decent before being sucked into what I call the “Crap-I” sewer. The slop is tainting many search engines and tools that use the garbage algorithms. Everyone using those junk search engines should do themselves a favor and switch to something more privacy-focused.
Egregious business decision by Nashville to give a fantastic coach like Trotz a shot at GM, And it all started when Trotz decided he wanted to continue to work in the NHL, But was tired of the travel, End the embarrassing experiment.
Still not buying on Pettersson. One bad season maybe, but it’s been over two of decline. If he’s just now thinking he needs to get bigger/stronger, he’s still behind the curve. Every player does that every off season.
“There are few better goaltending duos than Thatcher Demko and Kevin Lankinen,”
Is TSN really allowing their writers to drink on the job???