Over the last couple of years in the Western Conference, teams have begun to shift back to a physical style of play.
While some teams, like Nashville, have done so through a mid-year coaching change, others like Dallas have already been embracing it more over the last few seasons.
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Enter head coach Rick Tocchet, the former Utah HC head coach, who created a monster of his own in the Pacific Northwest.
Embracing this identity required the additions of Conor Garland, Carson Soucy, and Teddy Blueger, which upped the defensive intensity of the Canucks.
Brock Boeser, Elias Pettersson, and J.T. Miller up front also provided some scoring output for the physical Canucks to do their thing.
Utah, of course, took Ian Cole from Vancouver this past off-season, so his experience with the Canucks’ grind-you-down system will help the young defence core develop even more.
While the clubs may be far apart in terms of youth and experience, it doesn’t change the goals for Utah to be involved in meaningful games this season.
And Tocchet said Utah will have a chance to garner respect now that they’ve been given a fresh start.
We’re about to see how much respect they’ll be given by a Vancouver team that will clearly be hungry to go deeper into the Stanley Cup playoffs, and potentially challenge the Oilers for the Western Conference title.
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