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Canucks To Activate Dakota Joshua From IR

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Canucks forward Dakota Joshua will make his 2024-25 season debut against the Islanders on Thursday, Ben Kuzma of Postmedia reports. He’ll need to be activated from injured reserve ahead of tonight’s game. The Canucks recalled Jonathan Lekkerimäki and Aatu Räty from their brief demotions earlier today but left Arshdeep Bains on assignment to AHL Abbotsford, meaning he’ll say down for the foreseeable future while Joshua takes his roster spot.

Joshua had been held out of the lineup after undergoing successful offseason surgery to remove testicular cancer. He began practicing in a non-contact jersey a couple of weeks after the season started and had been upgraded to day-to-day last week.

He’ll play what Kuzma called “measured minutes” on the fourth line in his season debut tonight. Line rushes at practice this morning indicate that Joshua will play left wing alongside Räty and Höglander, per Brendan Batchelor of Sportsnet 650.

Joshua, 28, enters his third season in Vancouver coming off a breakout 2023-24 campaign. The Ohio State product recorded career highs across the board last season with 18 goals, 14 assists, 32 points, and a +19 rating while averaging 14:23 per game across 63 contests.

Vancouver’s third line with him, Teddy Blueger and Conor Garland last season was their most consistently deployed at 361 minutes together, and for good reason. They controlled 58.4% of expected goals, per MoneyPuck, ranking eighth among the 41 forward trios to log at least 300 minutes together in 2023-24.

Luckily for Joshua, that breakout came in a contract year. He parlayed that performance into a four-year, $13MM extension with a 12-team no-trade clause.

The Canucks’ active roster is now full at 13 forwards, eight defensemen and two goaltenders.

West Notes: Wild, Avalanche, Canucks, Stezka

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The Minnesota Wild have recalled forward Michael Milne to the NHL roster. The move comes after each of Jonas Brodin (lower-body), Marcus Johansson (illness), and Zach Bogosian (personal) missed the team’s Wednesday practice, per Michael Russo of The Athletic. Head coach John Hynes told Russo that Johansson and Bogosian are expected to play on Thursday, while Brodin is questionable.

Minnesota is already carrying seven defenders, with Declan Chisholm likely to step in if Brodin misses on Thursday. The team did not have an extra forward, though – requiring the call-up of Milne to cover Johansson’s potential absence. Chisholm has appeared in 10 games this season, recording three assists but yet to score his first goal of the year.

Meanwhile, Milne will rejoin the NHL roster just two days after being sent down. He received the first recall of his pro career last week, and was expected to make his NHL debut – but instead spent three games in the Wild press box. He likely isn’t locked into the lineup on this call-up either, unless Johansson ends up unavailable. Milne ranks second on the AHL’s Iowa Wild in scoring, with eight points in 10 games this season and three points in his latest two games.

Other notes from out West:

  • The Colorado Avalanche also made some roster moves, recalling forwards T.J. Tynan and Nikita Prishchepov after brief stints in the minor leagues. Both Tynan and Prishchepov have been regular fixtures of the Avalanche lineup amid their injury woes this season, each playing in six games and recording four points – though Prishchepov’s one goal is the only between the two. Colorado is soon expecting the return of Valeri Nichushkin from suspension and Jonathan Drouin from injury, but their pair of recalls will serve as understudies in the event of any change in plan.
  • While Minnesota and Colorado hedge their bets against injuries, the Vancouver Canucks have sent down top prospects Jonathan Lekkerimaki, Arshdeep Bains, and Aatu Raty in a paper transaction, per Jeff Paterson of Rink Wide: Vancouver. The Canucks will net just over $15.5K in cap space accrual with this move, helping continue to bank cap space over the course of the season. All three players will likely return to the lineup ahead of Vancouver’s Thursday matchup against the New York Islanders.
  • Rounding out Western Conference roster moves is Seattle’s assignment of goaltender Ales Stezka, who served as backup in the team’s Tuesday win over Columbus. Stezka has served as the starter for the AHL’s Coachella Valley Firebirds this season, posting a 2-5-0 record and .894 save percentage in seven games. He’s played ahead of top Kraken goalie prospect Niklas Kokko, who’s managed an .880 save percentage in four games. Stezka’s assignment suggests that Philipp Grubauer will soon return, after suffering an undisclosed injury away from the rink that forced him out of Tuesday’s game.

Canucks Recall Arshdeep Bains

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The Canucks announced Tuesday that they’ve recalled winger Arshdeep Bains from AHL Abbotsford.

Bains, 23, will likely make his eighth appearance of the season tonight against the Flames. The Canucks needed another forward on the active roster with Dakota Joshua not quite ready to come off injured reserve and Brock Boeser in the press box while he nurses the upper-body injury he sustained on a check to the head from Kings winger Tanner Jeannot on Nov. 7, which resulted in a three-game suspension.

The Surrey, British Columbia native has been sent between leagues on numerous occasions as the Canucks take advantage of his waiver-exempt status to accrue cap space on off days. The 6’0″, 184-lb winger has averaged 11:40 per game when in the lineup, scoring once and adding a -3 rating in seven appearances. His 0.14 points per game are the lowest among any Vancouver forward, although his 8.81 hits per 60 minutes rank fourth.

An undrafted free agent signing out of the WHL’s Red Deer Rebels in 2022, Bains has looked outmatched so far in his NHL minutes. He also went pointless with a -5 rating in eight appearances last season. This season, the Canucks have been out-attempted 86-75 with Bains on the ice at 5-on-5 – he’s the only Canucks forward on the active roster with a negative differential.

As such, Bains will likely be ferried off the roster on a more permanent basis when both Boeser and Joshua are back in the fold in the coming days. He’s made his first two AHL appearances of 2024-25 for Abbotsford over the past week, notching one goal and three assists.

Bains is in the final season of his entry-level contract and will be a restricted free agent next summer. He is not projected to have arbitration rights.

Brock Boeser Out Day-To-Day

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  • It became apparent rather quickly that Vancouver Canucks’ forward Brock Boeser would miss some time after being on the receiving end of a hit from Los Angeles Kings forward Tanner Jeannot which warranted a three-game suspension. Offering an update this afternoon, Vancouver’s play-by-play announcer, Brendan Batchelor, shared that Boeser is only expected to miss the next few days. This means that Boeser will likely miss Vancouver’s game tomorrow night against the Calgary Flames but could return for Thursday’s action against the New York Islanders.
  • Unfortunately, the Canucks won’t be able to replace Boeser with Dakota Joshua as Batchelor also shared he isn’t expected to return tomorrow. There’s no indication that Joshua suffered a setback in his recovery from testicular cancer. Still, the team is likely doing its due diligence to be sure that Joshua is fully healthy and ready for game speed.

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Canucks Recall Jonathan Lekkerimäki

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Nov. 11: The Canucks announced they’ve reversed the Silovs/Young flip, adding the Latvian back to the NHL roster while sending Young back to Abbotsford. Silovs played in yesterday’s game against the Oilers’ affiliate, the Bakersfield Condors, making 23 saves on 25 shots en route to a 4-2 win.

Nov. 10: The Canucks have shuffled their roster in a big way, announcing the recall of 2022 first-round pick Jonathan Lekkerimäki from AHL Abbotsford. He’s likely slated to make his NHL debut on Tuesday against the Flames.

They’ve also switched out their backup netminders. Arturs Silovs has been assigned to Abbotsford after a tough start to the season, while 20-year-old Ty Young has been recalled to serve as Kevin Lankinen’s No. 2 for now.

Arshdeep Bains and Nils Åman were also sent down to Abbotsford in corresponding transactions, giving them an open roster spot. That spot will likely be used to activate Dakota Joshua, who’s on the verge of returning after undergoing offseason surgery to remove testicular cancer, from injured reserve.

It’s far from an unexpected recall for Lekkerimäki. While he was banged up enough to miss last night’s contest for Abbotsford, he’s ready to go and should be available Tuesday. Most thought he would get the summons from the AHL after the Canucks dealt Daniel Sprong to the Kraken for future considerations on Friday, freeing up a lineup spot for a scoring winger. The 20-year-old Lekkerimäki has thrived this season, posting five goals and two assists in seven AHL contests.

Lekkerimäki is in his first full season in North America. The Swedish right-winger spent last season with Örebro HK of the Swedish Hockey League, where he broke out to lead the club in scoring with 19 goals and 31 points in 46 games. The 5’11”, 172-lb sniper closed out the year with a pair of points in six games for Abbotsford after his SHL campaign ended, but he’s taken leaps in his development over the summer. He’ll look to help jumpstart a Canucks offense that’s lagging slightly from last season, scoring 3.23 goals per game compared to 2023-24’s 3.40 mark.

While the Canucks would like to get a little more offense going, their goaltending situation is of much higher concern. While Thatcher Demko remains on the shelf with his popliteus muscle injury, Lankinen had been quite good as their temporary starter, entering last night’s game with a .923 SV%. That number is down to .905 after he conceded seven goals on 27 shots yesterday to the Oilers. At the same time, Silovs had been borderline unplayable as Lankinen’s backup with a .808 SV%, 4.77 GAA and -7.2 GSAA in just three starts and one relief appearance.

It’s not what Vancouver expected out of Silovs after the 23-year-old was forced into playoff action last year, doing well to record a .898 SV% and 2.91 GAA in 10 appearances after Demko and then-backup Casey DeSmith exited with injuries. The 2019 sixth-round pick doesn’t require waivers to head to the minors until next season, so the Canucks will take advantage of his exemption and ferry him back to Abbotsford to get him some additional development time. Silovs, who signed a two-year, $1.7MM contract after becoming a restricted free agent over the summer, now has a 3.17 GAA and .876 SV% in 13 regular-season NHL games dating back to the 2022-23 season.

Meanwhile, Young gets his first NHL recall just two games into his professional career. The 2022 fifth-round pick started the season on assignment to Kalamazoo, where he was lights out with a .974 SV% and 1.01 GAA in a pair of games. He was briefly recalled to Abbotsford last week but will bypass that level entirely for now, as he’s set to dress for his first NHL contest while Lankinen assumedly returns to action against Calgary. The 6’3″ netminder posted a .903 SV%, 2.79 GAA, one shutout, and a 23-11-0 record in 37 games for the Prince George Cougars of the Western Hockey League last season.

Bains has been subject to more than a few paper transactions this season, but with Joshua’s return pending, this demotion might be more permanent. The 23-year-old forward has one goal in seven games this season while averaging 11:40 per night.

Meanwhile, Åman returns to Abbotsford after being summoned solely for yesterday’s matchup with Edmonton. The 24-year-old center cleared waivers last week after sitting in the press box for four straight games. He has two assists and a -3 rating in five NHL showings for the Canucks this year and two assists in two games for Abbotsford.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Boeser Still Being Evaluated; Allvin Provides Other Injury Updates

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The Canucks will be without winger Brock Boeser tonight against Edmonton as he’s still being evaluated for the upper-body injury he sustained on Thursday, shares Sportsnet 650’s Brendan Batchelor (Twitter link).  After a breakout performance last season that saw him score 40 goals and 33 assists in 81 games, the 27-year-old is off to a nice start offensively this year with six goals and five assists in his first dozen games.  It’s a contract year for Boeser so he’ll certainly be hoping to avoid any long-term absence.

Meanwhile, Canucks GM Patrik Allvin shared some updates on a few other players to Batchelor and other reporters.  The team is hopeful that forward Dakota Joshua will make his season debut at some point on their current home stand as he continues to work his way back from testicular cancer.  Goaltender Thatcher Demko still has no timeline to make his season debut as his knee injury continues to keep him out of the lineup.  Lastly, prospect Jonathan Lekkerimaki (a speculative recall candidate following the Daniel Sprong trade), tweaked something and won’t be available for AHL Abbotsford tonight which takes him out of the potential recall equation for the time being.

Canucks Recall Nils Aman And Arshdeep Bains

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The Canucks have been quite busy on the transactions front over the last couple of weeks, shuffling players back and forth to save cap space and, in some cases, pause the waiver clock of certain players.  But with Friday’s trade of Daniel Sprong, they had a roster spot to try to fill on top of the usual paper moves.  They’ve done so by announcing (Twitter link) the recalls of center Nils Aman and winger Arshdeep Bains from AHL Abbotsford.

Aman cleared waivers last weekend after spending the first few weeks of the season in the NHL.  The 24-year-old had a very limited role over that stretch, however, only getting into four games and being scratched for the rest.  He had two assists in those outings on the fourth line but is more known for being a defensive player than a point producer at the top level.  Aman got into two games with Abbotsford following the demotion, picking up a pair of helpers there as well.

As for Bains, he has been no stranger to the shuffle as this is his fifth recall of the season already.  The 23-year-old has a goal in seven games so far this season while collecting 12 hits and averaging 11:40 per night.  Despite the frequent assignments to Abbotsford, Bains has played for them just once so far; he had a goal and two helpers in that contest.

With the promotions, Vancouver is now back to a full 23-player roster.  That said, with the frequency of their moves over the first few weeks of the season, that’s unlikely to be the case for too long.

Kraken Acquire Daniel Sprong From Canucks

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It appears Daniel Sprong will be returning to a team he’s already familiar with.  The Canucks announced that they have dealt the winger to the Kraken in exchange for future considerations.

Sprong has been a productive player over the last couple of seasons but it hasn’t resulted in him getting much stability.  In 2022-23, he had a breakout year in Seattle, notching 21 goals and 25 assists in 66 games.  Before that, his previous career-high in points was 23.  However, despite only being owed a qualifying offer of $787.5K, Seattle opted to non-tender him, getting out of a potential arbitration hearing in the process.

Still, the 27-year-old was able to do relatively well in free agency in 2023, landing a one-year, $2MM deal with Detroit.  He showed that his production the year before wasn’t a one-off, as he collected 18 goals and 25 assists in 76 games while only averaging 12 minutes a night of action.  But once again, he was non-tendered as the Red Wings opted to avoid the risk of arbitration as well.

Unfortunately for Sprong, the market wasn’t as strong this time around.  It took nearly three weeks into free agency before he found a contract when Vancouver signed him to a one-year, $975K contract, cutting his pay from the year before by more than half in the process.  It looked like a relatively shrewd pickup for a Canucks franchise that didn’t have much salary cap flexibility but wanted to add more offensive depth.

But things didn’t go as planned.  Sprong has been healthy scratched three times already this season and when he has played, he hasn’t been able to produce at the same level, tallying just one goal and two assists in nine games while averaging 11:39 per night.  Clearly, Vancouver had seen enough and decided the time was right to move on.

The Canucks are expected to welcome Dakota Joshua back to the lineup soon and it appears that this move will open up the roster spot to do so.  In the meantime, they’ve upped their cap space to over $1.9MM per PuckPedia, giving them much more in-season flexibility than they’ve had in recent years.  As for Seattle, they’re presently in LTIR and this move will push them a little deeper into it.  However, they’re still close enough to the $88MM cap that it shouldn’t be too difficult to get back under that amount when Vince Dunn is able to return.

Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman was the first to report the trade.

Kings’ Tanner Jeannot Receives Three Game Suspension

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5:43 PM: The Department of Player Safety announced Jeannot has been suspended three games for the hit on Boeser last night.

10:30 AM: The NHL Department of Player Safety announced today that Kings winger Tanner Jeannot will have a hearing today for an illegal check to the head against Canucks star Brock Boeser. It’s not an in-person hearing, so his pending suspension will be five games or less.

The incident occurred midway through the first period of last night’s 4-2 road win for Vancouver. Immediately after Boeser completed a neutral-zone pass, Jeannot attempted to lay an open-ice hit on Boeser while crossing the other direction. He led with his shoulder, making contact with Boeser’s head and knocking him out of the game (video via Lachlan Irvine of Canucks Army). Officials assessed Jeannot a match penalty on the play, initiating an automatic league review for supplemental discipline.

Vancouver has yet to give Boeser an injury designation, so he remains uncertain for tomorrow’s game against the Oilers. Hearings that do not result in suspensions are rare, so the Kings are undoubtedly preparing to be without Jeannot tomorrow against the Blue Jackets and potentially for a couple of more games afterward. The heavy-hitting power forward has never been suspended in his 242-game NHL career, but he has been fined once before for kneeing Senators captain Brady Tkachuk in March 2022.

The 15 PIMs assessed to Jeannot last night gave him 36 on the season, the most in the league. Through his first 15 games as a King, the 27-year-old has struggled to produce offensively, with just a goal and an assist while averaging 10:28 per game. So far, it’s not the resurgence L.A. hoped for when they parted ways with a pair of draft picks to acquire him from the Lightning in June. He hasn’t been a legitimate top-nine player offensively since his rookie season when he potted 24 goals and 41 points in 81 games for the Predators in 2021-22.

Three years later, it’s become clear that his play that season was more of a flash in the pan than anything else. In 146 games since for the Preds, Bolts and Kings, he has just 14 goals and 34 points with a -18 rating. Upon completing the two-year, $5.33MM deal he signed with Tampa Bay in 2023, he’ll be an unrestricted free agent next summer.

Canucks Notes: Demko, Forbort, Joshua

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The Canucks have waited a long time to see Thatcher Demko return to practice since exiting their first-round series against the Predators last season with a mysterious knee injury, and it finally came to pass yesterday, the team relayed. Vancouver has received expert goaltending from late-summer pickup Kevin Lankinen in the meantime (.923 SV%, 2.09 GAA), but getting last year’s Vezina Trophy runner-up back in the fold is still top of mind.

It’s the most demonstrable step toward a return that Demko has taken in months, although his return to practice has been on the horizon for the past week. He began working off-ice with goalie coach Marko Torenius last Friday and had an appointment to earn his medical clearance to practice earlier this week.

Demko told reporters during training camp that the specific injury was to the popliteus muscle in one of his knees. This small muscle in the back of the leg plays a key role in stabilizing the knee and allowing it to flex. Instances of popliteal injury in professional sports are rare, even more so in hockey, leading to much uncertainty around his return timeline over the past few months.

Demko, who will be 29 next month, had a career-best 35 wins, .918 SV%, 2.45 GAA, five shutouts, and 21.2 GSAA last season. In addition to finishing second in Vezina Trophy voting, he was selected to the 2024 NHL All-Star Game and was a Second-Team All-Star.

There’s more on the Canucks:

  • Injury news isn’t as positive regarding defenseman Derek Forbort, who could be sidelined for over a month with the knee injury he sustained in practice Monday, reports Irfaan Gaffar of Daily Faceoff. Forbort missed Tuesday’s win over the Ducks with the injury and missed most of October due to personal reasons, limiting him to just one appearance since Oct. 15. Since signing a one-year, $1.5MM contract in Vancouver in free agency, he has one assist and a -2 rating in four appearances while averaging 16:30 per game. The physical left-shot defender has registered just one hit and has controlled 51.8% of shot attempts and 33.3% of expected goals at even strength.
  • Dakota Joshua is still close to returning after undergoing surgery to remove testicular cancer over the offseason but won’t do so today versus the Kings, head coach Rick Tocchet told Sportsnet’s Iain MacIntyre. Tocchet said his absence from yesterday’s practice and unavailability today isn’t indicative of a setback but instead of the team’s cautious approach to his recovery. Joshua has missed all 11 Canucks games this season after signing a four-year, $13MM extension to stay in Vancouver a few days before the start of free agency.

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