Vancouver Canucks 2024-25 Stat Leaders Predictions – Hockey Writers – Vancouver Canucks

The Vancouver Canucks go into this season with high expectations, both as a team and individually. They finished with their second-highest total in franchise history, and many of their most popular players posted career highs in goals and points. Therefore, it will be difficult for everyone to repeat their success of last season. Hopefully they don’t back down too much and Canucks fans will see the usual suspects lead the way again in 2024-25. That said, let’s do some of the big math classes.

Goals: Brock Boeser

Brock Boeser’s 2023-24 season couldn’t have gotten off to a better start as he scored four goals in Game 1 against the Edmonton Oilers, including a natural hat trick. After that, he and the Canucks just kept rolling, reaching his first peak of 40 goals and a career-high 73 points. He didn’t slow down in the playoffs either, scoring his third hat trick of the season in Game 4 against the Nashville Predators when he scored two goals in as many minutes to tie the game and send it into overtime. Elias Lindholm finished the job, but he was the catalyst, coming off his hat trick with just eight seconds left in the third period.

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Boeser, unfortunately, saw his postseason cut short by a blood clot in his leg heading into Game 7 against the Oilers, but finished with seven goals and 12 points. He is reportedly healthy and ready to go in training camp, so barring any midseason issues, he should lead the way in goals again.

Assistants: Quinn Hughes

Quinn Hughes was a monster last season finishing with 92 points and taking home the Norris Trophy with 172 first place votes. Roman Josi was a distant second, with only twelve catches. He is now 77 points behind leading scorer Alex Edler, and he is only 24 years old. He is already the best Canucks defenseman in franchise history and will be years ahead of Edler when he retires. He led the team in assists with 75 last season, nine ahead of second-place JT Miller, and should do so again in 2024-25.

Hughes even thinks there is another level to his game, saying, “I felt like I missed a lot of scoring opportunities last year…And even though my scoring has gone up, I think it can go up again. All summer, I worked on scoring – scoring from the dot, scoring from the top of the circles. So I think I can score more points. I think I can score 20 goals. As for the rest (100 points), I’m not sure. For me, I’m going to try to be aggressive every night and push the pace, push my game, and wherever that takes me, it takes me. “

Hughes isn’t complacent, and that should scare opposing teams heading into the season. If he can increase his goals to 20 or more, he’ll be an even more dangerous threat from the blue line — and he’s already dead. What else can he do? It will be fun to find out.

Elias Pettersson had a “down” season according to many experts, yet he still finished with 34 goals and 89 points – the second highest point total of his career. The “low” part comes from the second half of the season, especially after dominating the month of January with 14 goals and 21 points in 13 games. He was reportedly injured at the time, which plagued him until the Canucks were eliminated by the Oilers in May. He had just seven goals and 21 points to finish the season, and one fewer goal and six points in the playoffs.

After an offseason, Pettersson should be back to his normal form when the puck drops on Oct. 9. He will have other new teammates to move on to (likely) Jake DeBrusk, as well as Nils Hoglander, Daniel Sprong or Danton Heinen. . The hope is that he can build the same chemistry Boeser has with Miller as at least one of the freshmen, and form another dynamic duo on the second line. If that happens, he should see an increase in scoring and maybe, just maybe hit a century for the second time in three seasons. Of course, Miller will also be in the running after leading the team with 103 points last season, but I give Pettersson the slight edge, mostly to send good vibes his way into 2024-25.

Power Play Goals: Brock Boeser

This is a toss-up between Boeser, Pettersson, and Miller, but I’ll go with Boeser to lead the team in power play goals. He had 16 points last season, three ahead of Pettersson and six ahead of Miller, and with his new prowess in front of the net, he should be able to score at least that many again. According to NHL EDGE, he scored 22 goals in the crease (five) or in the middle quadrant in front of the net (17), which ranked in the 98th percentile of the league. He has become more adept in high-danger areas, which should serve him well on the power play again this season.

Hits: Dakota Joshua or Kiefer Sherwood

Dakota Joshua led the way in this department last season, averaging 245 hits. Runner-up was Miller with 217, but considering Joshua only played 63 games to Miller’s 81, the small gap between the two is not accurate. Joshua averaged 3.88 strikeouts per game, so over the course of an 81-game season, he would have finished with 314 strikeouts, far ahead of Miller. All that is said is that Joshua will once again lead the team in scoring more goals this season. The only guy who has a chance to keep up with him is another parade participant, Kiefer Sherwood, who finished with 234 hits in 68 games with the Predators. When all is said and done, if both stay healthy, the Canucks could have two players eclipse the 300 mark.

Average Time on Ice: Quinn Hughes

Hughes has been a horse on the blue line since entering the league full time in 2019-2020. He has averaged 24:07 in his time on the ice thus far and has surpassed the 25-minute mark in two of the last three seasons. He saw a slight dip in ice time last season at 24:41 compared to 25:40, but that difference is small. Every head coach from Travis Green to Rick Tocchet relies on him in every situation, throwing him in there whenever they can. The now Canucks captain and EA Sports cover athlete will be featured heavily again this season as I don’t see Tocchet cutting back on his ice time anytime soon.

Additions/Removals: Quinn Hughes

You know what, it’s Hughes again. With how much ice he’s logged there (according to NHL EDGE he skated 289.33 miles in 2023-24) and how involved he is in the offense, it stands to reason he’ll have a high plus/minus. He didn’t sit well in this stat, but he’s a long way from the minus-24 he posted in 2020-21 when people still questioned his defensive ability. He led the team with a gaudy plus-38 last season, which also ranked fourth in the league behind Mattias Ekholm, Dylan DeMelo and Gustav Forsling. If the Canucks continue the same structure and score well this season, they should take the lead in this count again.

Canucks Stars Should Have Another Productive Season

All in all, the Canucks should have another season with their stars making noise on the stat sheet. I don’t see the core of Miller, Boeser, Pettersson, and Hughes slowing down, and with the addition of Heinen, Sprong, DeBrusk and Sherwood, they should have plenty of scoring depth to help them out. Either way, the season is right around the corner, and October 9th can’t come soon enough!