Off Season Changes Commence

After a disappointing season that saw the Canucks miss the playoffs for the first time in franchise history, off season changes are expected.  It did not take long after the Stanley Cup was handed out to the Jets for the Canucks to start these changes when they announced that they will be relieving Ken Hitchcock of his head coaching duties and replacing him with Jon Cooper.  

Hitchcock had a successful tenure with Canucks, leading them to a Stanley Cup final in the previous season.  But the last two season they did not have consistant play during the regular season.  It was rumored that the Canucks attempted to make this coaching change around last years trade deadline but were denied by the league for unknown reasons.  Whether Cooper could have changed their playoff fait last season will never be known but he will get a clean slate at the start of the season.  

The Canucks will now focus on their personel changes as they hope to bring their team back to cup contending status.  They have already completed two trades, one sending a third round pick to Chicago for defenceman Tim Erixon and the other sending RFA defencemen Jonathan Blum to NJ for prospect Cody Goloubef, a 4th round pick this season and a 2nd next.

The Canucks are in unfamilar territory as they have multiple picks in this years draft.  They may make a call to the Calgary GM to request the use of their scouting staff as they do not seem to ever have any picks to use.