The Vancouver Canucks were one of the best teams in the NHL on the penalty kill last season.
The Canucks were tied with the Devils for the second fewest power play goals against, giving up just 39 goals on the power play all season, thanks to a third-best 82.6% penalty kill percentage.
That’s a stark change from last season, when the Canucks were 17th in the NHL with a 79.1% penalty kill and an even bigger change from two seasons ago, when the Canucks were dead last in the league at 71.6%.
Adam Foote earned a lot of praise for the team’s improvement on the penalty kill as an assistant coach, but he’ll have to focus on the bigger picture as head coach. Fortunately, the Canucks were able to bring in Kevin Dean, who has extensive experience coaching the penalty kill in the NHL.
But beyond the changes behind the bench, the Canucks’ penalty kill will have a different look next season, as several players who played important roles on the penalty kill have left Vancouver.
So, who will play on the penalty kill next season?
To be clear, the question of who will kill penalties is distinct from the question of who should kill penalties. Sometimes, players who are not particularly good on the penalty kill end up with a lot of shorthanded ice time because everything about them makes it seem like they should be good at killing penalties — I’m looking at you, J.T. Miller.
Speaking of…
Canucks lost a few penalty killers
Over the past year, several of the Canucks’ penalty killers have left town.
At the top of the list is Pius Suter, who led the Canucks in shorthanded ice time last season, playing over 185 minutes on the penalty kill. He and Teddy Blueger were typically first over the boards when the Canucks took a penalty, and his departure in free agency is arguably the biggest blow to the Canucks’ penalty kill.
Obviously, J.T. Miller was a regular on the penalty kill and was traded away, as was Dakota Joshua, though Joshua’s importance to the Canucks’ penalty kill is somewhat overstated.
Joshua was ninth among Canucks forwards in total shorthanded ice time last season and tenth in time on ice per game on the penalty kill. Danton Heinen actually played a much bigger role on the penalty kill before he was traded.
On defence, Carson Soucy, Vincent Desharnais, and Noah Juulsen played significant minutes on the penalty kill when they were in the Canucks’ lineup and are now gone.
So, there are a few penalty killers to replace, though the Canucks obviously got started on replacing some of them in the midst of the 2024-25 season.
Who was good on the penalty kill last season?
The question of who the Canucks’ best penalty killers were last season is a tough one to answer with any sort of objectivity, as it’s tough to fully capture the impact a penalty killer has via analytics.
Still, we’ll do what we can.
I like to look at unblocked shots against (fenwick), shots on goal against, and goals against. Even though those statistics don’t cover important aspects like pre-shot puck movement and where the shot is coming from on the ice, they’re still useful. If a player is on the ice for a lot of shots and goals against, they’re probably doing a bad job.
Here are the Canucks skaters who played at least 25 minutes shorthanded last season.
Two former Canucks led the way in fenwick on the penalty kill: Vincent Desharnais and Dakota Joshua.
Though Desharnais struggled at 5-on-5, he was very effective on the penalty kill, where his limited ability to move the puck played less of a factor.
Joshua’s excellent numbers on the penalty kill should be considered in conjunction with his lower time on ice, as he generally saw more second power play units than first power play units. Still, Joshua is a solid penalty killer and should get more opportunities to play shorthanded with the Toronto Maple Leafs.
Fortunately, the Canucks had several good penalty killers last season who are still with the team.
On defence, Derek Forbort and Marcus Pettersson immediately stand out. The penalty kill is one of Forbort’s biggest strengths, and he excelled last season. Aside from Desharnais, he was on the ice for the lowest rate of shots on goal and goals against on the Canucks.
Pettersson, meanwhile, was outstanding on the penalty kill after the Canucks acquired him from the Pittsburgh Penguins. Aside for a few blips on a rebuilding Penguins team, Pettersson has consistently been a solid penalty killer throughout his career. He and Forbort ought to be the linchpins of the penalty kill on defence.
After those two, things get a bit dicier. Filip Hronek and Tyler Myers were middling on the penalty kill last season. Perhaps if those two right-side defencemen pair with Forbort and Pettersson, they’ll hold their own.
The two worst defencemen by fenwick were Juulsen and Soucy, who are both gone.
As for forwards, Conor Garland and Kiefer Sherwood look good by the underlying numbers, as does Drew O’Connor, though he was on the ice for a high number of goals against, which raises some eyebrows.
The opposite is true for Pius Suter and Teddy Blueger. Taking into account the context that they were typically on the first unit playing against the opposition’s top power plays, they were on the ice for a relatively high number of shot attempts against, but had the lowest goals against among Canucks forwards.
That raises the question: how much of that was due to their efforts and how much was due to the goaltenders behind them. The credit should be split between them and the goaltenders, but how much credit do Suter and Blueger deserve?
In any case, Garland and Sherwood could potentially be a penalty killing duo next season, or one of them could partner with Blueger, while the other plays with O’Connor or another forward. Notably, Garland killed penalties for Kevin Dean on Team USA at the 2025 World Championships.
Teams typically have three forward duos for the penalty kill, so that leaves a couple of openings with the players who left town.
The real concern here is Elias Pettersson. He’s been quite good on the penalty kill in previous seasons, but struggled last season as he did in so many other facets of the game. Among Canucks forwards, Pettersson was on the ice for the second-highest rate of unblocked shots against, the third-highest rate of shots on goal against, and the third-highest rate of goals against.
Why does that matter? Well, someone’s got to take faceoffs; more on that later.
Maybe Pettersson can bounce back on the penalty kill, as the Canucks are hoping he’ll bounce back at even-strength and on the power play. We’ll see.
The Canucks’ worst penalty killer in all three statistics, incidentally, was J.T. Miller.
Reinforcements from the farm?
The Canucks are hoping that a few of their farmhands are ready to make the jump to the NHL full-time next season.
There will be some competition at training camp, but the likely candidates to make the team at forward include Aatu Räty, Arshdeep Bains, Linus Karlsson, and Max Sasson.
Jonathan Lekkerimäki also has a shot at making the team, but he’s not exactly a candidate to kill penalties.
If Räty, Bains, Karlsson, and Sasson are going to carve out bottom-six roles with the Canucks next season, the penalty kill might have to be part of their portfolio. Of the three, only Räty was used on the penalty kill in Vancouver last season, albeit very briefly. They killed penalties in Abbotsford, but the NHL is a different beast.
Another player to consider is Ty Mueller, who was a go-to penalty killer for Manny Malhotra in Abbotsford. It stands to reason that he’ll get opportunities on the penalty kill if and when he gets called up to Vancouver.
On defence, Victor Mancini was typically first over the boards on the penalty kill for Abbotsford, while Kirill Kudryavtsev was used less often, but held his own.
Mancini has an outside shot at making the Canucks out of camp, and his ability to kill penalties could factor into whether he makes the team. That said, he has some stiff competition in Elias “Junior” Pettersson.
The youngest Pettersson played about eight minutes on the penalty kill in the NHL last season, averaging just 17 seconds per game. If he’s a regular on the blue line in the coming season, as many anticipate, he’ll likely need to play a larger role on the penalty kill, perhaps taking minutes away from Hronek.
The other defenceman to consider is Tom Willander.
The Canucks’ top prospect was a smothering shutdown defenceman for Boston University, which included playing on their first penalty killing unit. Willander’s defensive game is polished enough that he should be ready to play NHL games in this coming season, which likely means some time on the penalty kill as well.
Who will take faceoffs?
It’s all well and good looking at who was on the ice for the fewest shots or goals against, but when coaches look at the penalty kill, one of the first things they’re going to ask is, “Who’s going to take the faceoffs?”
That was a major reason why Miller got so many opportunities on the penalty kill despite the shots and goals against making a compelling argument that he shouldn’t be out there: he’s a beast on faceoffs.
Last season, Blueger led the Canucks with 250 shorthanded faceoffs. He led by a wide margin: next was Suter with 52, then Miller with 51, Pettersson with 19, Sherwood with 16, and Räty with 11.
That’s not because Blueger was particularly good in the faceoff circle. He won just 42.0% of his shorthanded faceoffs, which dragged down his overall numbers, as he was quite good at even strength, finishing with a 50.3% faceoff percentage overall.
Ideally, the Canucks’ go-to centre on the penalty kill would be better on faceoffs than Blueger.
That’s where Räty might be able to step in. Räty is a bonafide faceoff ace, winning 57.4% of his draws last season, second only to Miller on the Canucks. Among centres who took at least 300 faceoffs, Räty was 11th in the NHL in faceoff percentage.
Räty showed he could win faceoffs on the penalty kill last season, albeit in a very small sample size. He went 7-for-11 when called upon to take faceoffs on the penalty kill, often winning the draw then sprinting to the bench to change.
The question for Räty is whether he can be relied upon to be a regular penalty killer. If he can, then problem solved: Räty can take shorthanded faceoffs and just stay on the ice. But there’s a reason why Rick Tocchet and Adam Foote had him sprinting to the bench last season — he had some defensive mishaps that made him tough to trust.
The only other centre that makes sense to play on the penalty kill is Pettersson. While Pettersson has steadily improved on faceoffs, inching above 50% in 2023-24, he finished with a 47.5% faceoff percentage last season.
When called upon to take a faceoff on the penalty kill last season, he was 52.6%, but that just means he won 10 faceoffs and lost 9, a sample size only slightly larger than Räty’s.
Still, Pettersson might have to be a regular penalty killer next season, especially if the team doesn’t add another centre and Räty fails to solidify a spot on the penalty kill. If Pettersson can be a bit more consistent on faceoffs, that would certainly help his team’s cause.
A sidebar on faceoffs
Some early work in hockey analytics downplayed the importance of winning faceoffs, as faceoff winning percentage has essentially no big picture correlation to winning games. This is partly because there’s so much parity when it comes to faceoffs.
Look at it this way: of the Canucks centres who took at least 100 faceoffs last season, the worst faceoff percentage belonged to Pius Suter at 42.6%. Essentially, for every five faceoffs he took, he won two and lost three. That’s not a huge swing.
Notably, Suter was also one of the Canucks’ best penalty killers last season, so his struggles to win faceoffs did not hurt the Canucks too much, though that was partly because he was paired with Teddy Blueger, who took most of the draws. That said, Blueger won just 42.0% of those shorthanded faceoffs, so he was about the same as Suter.
That’s not to say that faceoffs don’t matter at all. In fact, the penalty kill is where faceoffs matter the most. The vast majority of neutral zone faceoffs, for instance, are inconsequential in the grand scheme of things. What matters far more is what happens after a faceoff is won or lost in terms of keeping or winning possession of the puck and either attacking or defending.
The ability to ice the puck with impunity on the penalty kill, however, means that winning faceoffs while shorthanded can be vital. A clean faceoff win typically means an easy clear, killing off as much as 20 seconds of a power play in one fell swoop of the stick.
A clean loss, on the other hand, means the opposing power play can quickly get set up in the offensive zone and immediately get to work on creating a grade-A scoring chance.
That’s why Miller was often on the ice for key faceoffs on the penalty kill and why Räty was used as a faceoff specialist for a few seconds at a time while shorthanded.
Still, the fact that one of the Canucks’ worst penalty killers was their best man on faceoffs, while a couple of their best penalty killers were thoroughly mediocre on the draws means that maybe we shouldn’t place all that much importance on faceoff prowess.
It’s all well and good when a bad penalty killer wins a faceoff; the trouble is that when he loses the faceoff, he has to stay on the ice and kill the penalty.
