Canucks Nation is not in a good mood.
Never mind the hockey club’s pedestrian 8-9-1 start to the NHL season, but now the Vancouver Canucks will be without the services of goaltender Thatcher Demko for the next “two-to-three weeks with a minor injury” according to a post on X by NHL insider Frank Seravalli.
Demko appeared to have suffered the injury in the first period of Tuesday night’s 4-2 loss to the Winnipeg Jets at Rogers Arena. He exited the game after allowing three goals on eight shots.
Although the organization was not willing to reveal what the injury was, CHEK TV’s Rick Dhaliwal is reporting that it’s a groin injury. The Canucks did say that the injury was not related to the issue that caused Demko not to dress for two games this past weekend.
The Canucks have been riddled with injuries to start the 2025-26 campaign but can ill afford to lose Demko for an extended period of time.
If you were to view Demko’s injury in a vacuum, there really shouldn’t be too much concern. He should rehabilitate whatever the ailment is and return to help the hockey club by the end of the month.
Unfortunately, when looking at the big picture, Demko’s latest injury is yet another that has sidelined the 29-year-old netminder and his durability has come into question again.
Demko has been hampered by injuries the past four seasons. He appeared in 64 games during the 2021-22 season but has only managed to play 32, 51 and 23 games in subsequent seasons.
What compounds the problem is that backup Kevin Lankinen has yet to show he can carry the workload of a #1 goalie in the NHL. Lankinen’s career-high in games played is the 51 contests he appeared for the Canucks last season. In fact, the most the affable Finn has played in a single season prior to that was the 42 games he played for with HIFK Helsinki way back in 2016-17.
When Demko was injured last spring, Lankinen faded as the workload increased as evidenced by his 3.17 goals against average and .868 save percentage in March when he appeared in 11 games. Further to that, his numbers with three days rest or more were 2.14; .921; with two days rest 2.73, .902 and with one day rest 3.12, .883.
Notice a trend?
With Demko’s durability in question yet again, Canuck fans are wondering why President of Hockey operations Jim Rutherford and General Manager Patrik Allvin felt compelled to give him a three-year contract extension on July 1, 2025 worth $25.5 million with an AAV of $8.5 million.
It’s a good number for an all-star goaltender like Demko but you’re also expecting your #1 goalie to be capable of playing in 50-plus games over the course of a season.
Demko’s injury is yet another blow to the team which has lost second-line center Filip Chytil to a concussion after just six games. In addition, forwards Teddy Blueger, Jonathan Lekkerimaki and Nils Hoglander as well as defensemen Derek Forbort and Victor Mancini are also sidelined.
It’s expected that Jiri Patera will back-up Lankinen during Demko’s absence. The 26-year-old native of Prague has played in a grand total of eight NHL games with the Vegas Golden Knights during his career but with back-to-back games in San Jose and Los Angeles this weekend, he will probably be pressed into duty.
To compound matters, the injuries at the NHL level are creating chaos within the organization as the Canucks’ AHL farm club in Abbotsford is now on an 11-game losing streak due to the ripple effect of those injuries to their roster.
OVERTIME
* One bright spot for the Canucks this season has been the play of Kiefer Sherwood, who scored in back-to-back games against the Jets and the Colorado Avalanche to give him 11 tallies on the season. Sherwood scored a career-high 19 goals in his first campaign as a Canuck last year but is on pace to easily eclipse that total this year.
* The Canucks survived an injury scare when defenseman Quinn Hughes left the game in the second period after taking a high-sticking penalty while battling with Winnipeg’s Mark Scheifele. Hughes went to the dressing room before returning to the game shortly thereafter. The Canucks captain appeared to have suffered a shoulder injury but Hughes stated after the game that he was ‘all good’ after the encounter.
* The Canucks penalty kill unit continues to be an issue. After allowing two power play goals against Winnipeg, the PK unit sits dead last in the NHL with a 64.9% kill rate with 20 goals given up in 57 chances. Last season, Vancouver had the third-best PK in the NHL when it killed off 82.9% of chances and only allowed 39 power play goals.
* Not only is the condensed schedule a physical grind, it’s also causing mental fatigue according to one player I talked to. Players are used to resetting and refocusing after a game yet are still expected to try and learn from the previous game. That’s fine when you have a couple of days in between games but the condensed schedule compounds that. I was told that the mental approach this year is similar to what players got through in the playoffs.
Veteran B.C. sports personality Bob “the Moj” Marjanovich writes about the B.C. sporting scene for Black Press Media. This column is brought to you by:
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