The Los Angeles Kings and Vancouver Canucks are playing their first meeting of the season Thursday. While they haven’t played yet, the four games to come could well be a Kings-Canucks playoff preview.
They are the last teams in the league from the same division to play each other. This means all four games between them are coming up, and the stakes are high.
First Place and Kings-Canucks Playoff Stakes
The time has come, the writer said,
To talk of many things.
Of playoff spots – and power plays –
Canucks and LA Kings.
Vancouver and LA aren’t the only teams waiting for debut matches. For instance, the Columbus Blue Jackets have yet to play three Western teams. The Edmonton Oilers also have three teams waiting, including the Colorado Avalanche. But none of them have the possible impact of the series between the Canucks and the Kings.
The two are in different places and built in radically different ways. One has a history of Stanley Cup wins through supposedly impossible means. The other a decade of desperately avoiding a rebuild despite repeated failures. It’s an interesting comparison of two approaches reaching a head in 2024.
Not So Blue
Vancouver has, to the amazement of everyone including themselves, been one of the best teams in the league this season. It’s a position they hold despite a recent 1-4-1 run leading to Thursday’s game. In those games lie the first time the team has lost three in a row all year.
Just about everyone on the Canucks has had a “Hero Run” this year, too. Either Elias Pettersson is roaring out of the gate with five goals and 16 points in October, or Thatcher Demko is going 9-1-0 with two shutouts through January. Or it’s the sudden emergence of Dakots Joshua and Conor Garland working perfectly as an instant third line.
Or Nils Höglander becomes a Cy Young candidate with 18 goals and 26 points in less than 12 minutes per game. Brock Boeser finally hit that elusive 30-goal mark in his 49th game. J.T. Miller looking like he’ll casually walk past 100 points by season’s end. Quinn Hughes having another Norris-worthy season.
Speaking of Hughes, even Vancouver’s suspect defence is working well beyond expectations. Filip Hronek fits in perfectly on the top pair. Noah Juulsen has emerged as a solid – if imperfect – right-side defender. Even the oft-maligned Tyler Myers has resisted most criticism.
LA’s Story
The Kings had a different approach. After spending a few years collecting high draft picks and rebuilding, they put pressure on to win. That included changing their coach and general managers, moving picks and prospects for veterans, and locking up what are hopefully cornerstone players.
The results have been somewhat more mixed than hoped, but that doesn’t mean they failed. They had two first-round losses in the previous two seasons, which was better than the misses. Now was the time for the next step, though. Time to bring in talent instead of potential and carve a permanent spot in the playoff race.
They had already brought in Kevin Fiala last year and signed him to a seven-year deal. A fading Jonathan Quick and his contract was cleared out. The perfectly decent Sean Durzi was sent away to make room for a sign-and-trade deal netting Pierre-Luc Dubois.
Extending Vladislav Gavrikov was given, though an eight-year deal for Michael Anderson was a bit surprising. Most importantly, they had revamped the forwards and solidified the defence. And with their remaining cap space, they backed up the new-ish team with Dave Rittich and Cam Talbot on one-year deals.
They’ve both been fine! Even very good for stretches! But as the ones to take the team to “the next level”? That’s a bit hard to picture. Still, the bet was spending enough in front of the net lets a team spend less in it.
The team replaced head coach Todd McLellan after 48 games. So things aren’t going quite as well as planned.
The Kings-Canucks Playoff Precursor
The Kings and the Canucks are at opposite ends of the playoff race spectrum. Vancouver has been established as a definite playoff team for a month now. LA, on the other hand, has a five-point buffer in the wild card slot. That’s a big lead with 24 games to go, but Nashville and Calgary are both on winning streaks.
Obviously, other teams are involved between now and the end of the regular season. Neither Vancouver’s nor Los Angeles’ fates will be decided in these four games. Add the trade deadline and their situations can change drastically between now and Game 82. But they are each other’s most impactful rivals for the next two months.
A Canucks Sweep
A sweep of all four games isn’t likely, not for Vancouver and not for LA. But winning two of the next three games will help right a listing Canucks team. Shaking off a lousy road trip to stretch to go three in five is a real boost in confidence.
It would also mean Vancouver wins at least four of their next 16 games. Double that and they’re one point from the century mark, which is a positive spin on even a mediocre record. Any better than that, and it’s a boost to keeping first in the West.
For LA, it would spell disaster. That’s at least four losses in their next 19 games.* There is some chance that if they go on a losing streak one of the teams chasing them can bump them right out of the playoffs. It’s not likely, but it is possible.
The two games against Calgary and Minnesota can take on far more meaning should LA slip.
But even if not, they are setting themselves up for a first-round matchup against – who else – the Vancouver Canucks. Meeting the team that not only swept you during the regular season but did it recently isn’t cause for optimism.
The Saw-Off
One team getting five or six points while the other gets four or five wouldn’t be a surprise. There’s an assumption of overtime in at least a couple matches, and neither team is great there.
For Vancouver, if it’s the early two games they win that would help them get past their mini-slump. If the later ones, it sets them up nicely for the start of the post-season. Should they face the Kings in the playoffs, the losses will serve as a reminder to take the lower seed seriously.
For Los Angeles, even this modest result can give them some confidence. They’ve had their own difficulties, getting a “new coach bump” with five wins in six games before losing three of their next four. Those three losses came against Edmonton, Calgary, and Nashville, all teams in direct competition with them.
Given the choice of which two they’d want to win in this mini-series, both would choose the early matches. That’s only going to add spice to this condensed set.
An LA Sweep
Again, a sweep isn’t likely, but they play the games for a reason.
The Canucks are safe enough at this point that getting four losses – even against a division rival – isn’t fatal. It wouldn’t help keep their spot on top of the Western Conference, certainly. But they won’t lose their place to the Kings.
However, it does make facing the Kings in the first round of the playoffs a possibility once again. Should Vancouver slip badly enough to lose their place atop the Pacific, and LA rides a hot streak that includes those losses, they could well meet in the middle.
And one of those teams will have swept the other in recent memory. If these teams do meet in the post-season, then expect any result from this little Kings-Canucks playoff preview to be replayed right until puck drop.
*They have games to make up. Don’t think a compressed schedule is an advantage, though.
Main photo by: Jayne Kamin-Oncea-USA TODAY Sports
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