80s' Canucks

[The Panther]

I was wondering about the 1980s'-era Canucks. I saw them play a bit (against Edmonton, or occasionally against Calgary) during the years 1986 to 1989, but I didn't see any of the earlier years.

To state the obvious, they were not good in this era. I give them a pass for the 70s because they were an expansion team in the era when expansion teams sucked (though Philly and Buffalo got going quicker). I note they did have two winning seasons in a row in 1975 and 1976, but I'm sure since it was in Van nobody in Toronto or Montreal noticed. After those two decent years, back to losing.

But then in the 80s the Canucks did not take any strides forward from the 70s, as far as I can see. If anything, they got worse.

Going backwards from 1989-90 to 1980-81:

1989-90	80	25	41	14	64	.400	5th		B. McCammon (25-41-14)
1988-89	80	33	39	8	74	.463	4th	Lost NHL Division Semi-Finals	B. McCammon (33-39-8)
1987-88	80	25	46	9	59	.369	5th		B. McCammon (25-46-9)
1986-87	80	29	43	8	66	.413	5th		T. Watt (29-43-8)
1985-86	80	23	44	13	59	.369	4th	Lost NHL Division Semi-Finals	T. Watt (23-44-13)
1984-85	80	25	46	9	59	.369	5th		B. LaForge (4-14-2), H. Neale (21-32-7)
1983-84	80	32	39	9	73	.456	3rd	Lost NHL Division Semi-Finals	R. Neilson (17-26-5), H. Neale (15-13-4)
1982-83	80	30	35	15	75	.469	3rd	Lost NHL Division Semi-Finals	R. Neilson (30-35-15)
1981-82	80	30	33	17	77	.481	2nd	Lost Stanley Cup Final	H. Neale (26-33-16), R. Neilson (4-0-1)
1980-81	80	28	32	20	76	.475	3rd	Lost NHL Preliminary Round	H. Neale (28-32-20)

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

5 coaches in the 10 seasons, one 2nd place finish (and that with a .481 record!), and six 4th/5th place finishes (in a five team division) in a row to close out the decade. Missed the playoffs four times in the era when 76% of teams made it in.

The only notable moment, of course, was the 1982 run to the Cup Finals... though this is basically remembered -- even by Canuck fans, I think -- as one of those fluky runs that occurs when better teams go out early. They were handily swept aside by the Isles in the Finals. They drafted Linden in summer '88 and he had a good rookie campaign and playoffs.

Even though it was a higher-scoring era, the biggest point season by any Canuck in this decade was Patrik Sundstrom's 91 points in 1983-84. That was the one and only 90-point season by any Canuck in the entire decade. Only four other players (incl. Gradin twice) even managed 80-point seasons the whole decade.

The top 10 scorers of this decade:

1	Stan Smyl	543	RW	-103
2	Tony Tanti	470	RW/LW	-57
3	Thomas Gradin	424	C	-41
4	Petri Skriko	365	LW	-84
5	Patrik Sundstrom	342	RW/C	-47
6	Rick Lanz	227	D	-78
7	Darcy Rota	225	LW	15
8	Doug Lidster	215	D	-99
9	Barry Pederson	197	C	-13
10	Doug Halward	163	D	-106

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

To put this in perspective, the Canucks as a franchise scored 2804 goals for the decade (a goal differential of -347), while Wayne Gretzky individually scored 1842 points (66% of the Canucks' franchise total).

Anyway, what I'm sort of wondering is why/how did the Canucks do so badly in the 80s? By a "normal" franchise parabola, you'd sort of expect them to be on an upswing by the early 80s (it may have appeared so in the '82 playoff run), but they seemed to almost get worse as the decade went on. Three of four seasons in a row, from '84 to '88, they had a .369 win percentage.

Was it poor drafting? Trades? (Pederson for Neely probably didn't help, though that wasn't until '86.) Division competition from Edmonton/Calgary? (But Winnipeg entered in '80 and did notably better than Vancouver that decade.) Coaching? The yellow uniforms?

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[frisco]

The Canucks defined mediocre in the 80's. Just lack of any top end talent. Apologies to Thomas Gradin and Doug Halward. And Brodeur outside of the 1982 run wasn't really an upper level goalie. Other than Neely, they missed on a lot of picks (Dan Woodley 7th, Jason Herter 8th, Jim Sandlak 4th). And having Calgary and Edmonton to contend with on a yearly basis just buried them as far as relevancy goes. Good post.

My Best-Carey

 

[decma]

The Canucks defined mediocre in the 80's. Just lack of any top end talent. Apologies to Thomas Gradin and Doug Halward. And Brodeur outside of the 1982 run wasn't really an upper level goalie. Other than Neely, they missed on a lot of picks (Dan Woodley 7th, Jason Herter 8th, Jim Sandlak 4th). And having Calgary and Edmonton to contend with on a yearly basis just buried them as far as relevancy goes. Good post.

My Best-Carey

Yes, bad drafting (e.g. too many d-men and big forwards) and bad trades of the few good draft picks they did make (e.g., they get Vaive and Ashton in the first two rounds of the 79 draft, and squander them).

Also, for a team that was that bad, their draft placement wasn't great. They were usually picking around 10th overall and were not in the top 3 until the Linden year.

In that sense, somewhat similar to the recent Canucks. Near bottom of standings for many years, but never at bottom to get a number 1 pick.

 

[streitz]

They weren't as bad as you're making them out to be, the smythe was a hard division. If they were in the Norris they would have been one of the top teams throughout the decade.


That being said.

Smyl was solid but not a superstar
Gradin was a solid center, but not a real gamebreaker. One of the toughest swedes along with Steen.
Tanti was a good ballsy little player but got banged up
Williams was.... well we all know he was a clown but he intimidated the flames single handed in 82.
Sundstrom was talented but opposed to Gradin he was extremely soft. Somehow he had an 8 point playoff game with the devils in 88.
Pederson was a shell of his former self but still decent.

I can't think of a single good D man they had throughout the decade.
Brodeur was a decent goalie but not good enough to bail that team out. Mclean was solid.


They had to play the Oilers,Flames and even the Jets 8 times a year. If they could of feasted on crap teams like the Wings, North Stars and especially the leafs they'd be remembered better. Ditto for the jets who actually played in the norris for a year.

 

[frisco]

They weren't as bad as you're making them out to be, the smythe was a hard division. If they were in the Norris they would have been one of the top teams throughout the decade.

That might be a stretch. To go from a -347 goal differential and never finishing .500 to "one of the top teams throughout the decade" just by switching up divisions in my mind is hugely wishful thinking.

My Best-Carey

 

[The Panther]

I don't think the Smythe was a particularly hard division -- on balance, maybe it was the 3rd most difficult of 4 (though arguably it had the hardest team to get past).

Here's how this era's Canucks did vs. Norris teams (incl. 1980-81, which was pre-Norris), for interest:
.597 vs. Toronto
.435 vs. Minnesota
.435 vs. Chicago
.403 vs. Detroit
.403 vs. St.Louis
.455

For the whole decade, they went .426, so it is slightly better but hardly a big difference maker. (To be fair, 31 games in 10 years against each club is a small sample size.)

This is how they did against the Smythe teams (incl. 1980-81, which was pre-Smythe), for comparison:
.296 vs. Calgary (ouch!)
.270 vs. Edmonton (ouch!)
.487 vs. Los Angeles
.486 vs. Winnipeg
.385

 

[puckpilot]

Basically they had bad management and with a few exceptions bad coaching until Pat Quinn came. Hence the dismal drafting and trading. And to top it off, though they were bad, they weren't bad enough to get the top picks to score a franchise player.

Everyone knows about the Neely trade but before that it was Rick Vaive.

And this was a little before my time but I heard people say those two winning seasons in the 70s was on the back of their goalie Gary "Suitcase" Smith, who they then trade, and well, began to suck again.

In terms of their 80s cup run, yeah it was a bit of a fluke, but it was on the backs of a gritty group, who played their hearts out. Think of Florida's third year cup run for a more modern example.

 

[Johnny Engine]

I can't think of a single good D man they had throughout the decade.

Snepsts is the guy that jumps to mind as the Canucks defenseman of that decade.
Kevin McCarthy, Rick Lanz and (for a shorter time) Paul Reinhart were the most productive.
Garth Butcher and Doug Lidster played the most games for the franchise.

Player Season Finder | Hockey-Reference.com

 

[streitz]

That might be a stretch. To go from a -347 goal differential and never finishing .500 to "one of the top teams throughout the decade" just by switching up divisions in my mind is hugely wishful thinking.

My Best-Carey

I mean best team in the Norris btw, not decade, my mistake

 

[streitz]

Snepsts is the guy that jumps to mind as the Canucks defenseman of that decade.
Kevin McCarthy, Rick Lanz and (for a shorter time) Paul Reinhart were the most productive.
Garth Butcher and Doug Lidster played the most games for the franchise.

Player Season Finder | Hockey-Reference.com

Reinhart they only had for a year, didn't have much of an opinion on McCarthy or Lanz. Thought they were average.


Wasn't McCarthy the guy who broke his ankle right before the 82 run?

 

[The Panther]

Yeah, it's hard for me to even remember 80s' Canucks defencemen, except for Harold Snepts.

 

[The Panther]

(Found it! I thought I had done a short-lived "1980s' Canucks" thread several years ago...!)

This short video came up on YouTube last week. It's a close look at the Vancouver Canucks' road trip of Feb. 5th to Feb. 12th, 1984:


At what was seemingly a key moment in their (not very good) season, they go a decent 3 and 2 on a pretty tough road trip, beating Quebec, Montreal, and Philly (the clip includes Guy Lafleur's final hat-trick as a Canadien). Canucks include Harold Snepts, Stan Smyl, Patrick Sundstrom, Cam Neely, Tiger Williams. The coach is Harry Neale, who I believe had only recently come back behind the bench after he fired Roger Neilson.

 

[Boxscore]

(Found it! I thought I had done a short-lived "1980s' Canucks" thread several years ago...!)

This short video came up on YouTube last week. It's a close look at the Vancouver Canucks' road trip of Feb. 5th to Feb. 12th, 1984:


At what was seemingly a key moment in their (not very good) season, they go a decent 3 and 2 on a pretty tough road trip, beating Quebec, Montreal, and Philly (the clip includes Guy Lafleur's final hat-trick as a Canadien). Canucks include Harold Snepts, Stan Smyl, Patrick Sundstrom, Cam Neely, Tiger Williams. The coach is Harry Neale, who I believe had only recently come back behind the bench after he fired Roger Neilson.

Watched this on my way to work today -- awesome! Loved those uniforms and visiting all the legendary barns like the old Spectrum. Great stuff. In regards to the "Flying V" unis... imho, they're the second greatest set-up in NHL history behind the Quebec Nordiques. And they were the most "menacing" looking with that wicked Halloween color scheme and pointed V.

 

[vikash1987]

I’ve been recently revisiting the Canucks’ Cinderella run in 1982. FWIW, I personally love those “V” uniforms! I always found it cool that there were so many European players on that team who had such a high impact: Boldirev, Hlinka, Gradin, et al. Unfortunately, that team wasn’t built around their draft picks—the way, say, the Islanders were built—and this probably caught up with them as the decade progressed.

 

[hacksaw7]

Sandlak got a really really long look...he was a bust though not a completely worthless player. Good enough to play in the league. Still Vancouver stuck with him for 8 seasons and then re aquired him in the mid 90s. I wonder if Neely suddenly flourishing in Boston made them extra patient with Sandlak in hoping he turns into that power forward who can score type.

 

[hacksaw7]

I’ve been recently revisiting the Canucks’ Cinderella run in 1982. FWIW, I personally love those “V” uniforms! I always found it cool that there were so many European players on that team who had such a high impact: Boldirev, Hlinka, Gradin, et al. Unfortunately, that team wasn’t built around their draft picks—the way, say, the Islanders were built—and this probably caught up with them as the decade progressed.

One thing I remember is they were playing great hockey towards the end of the season (6-0-3 in their last 9) and they carried it right into the playoffs and kept it going as long as they could

They also got the immense good fortune of LA upsetting Edmonton (to this day I cant believe it. A 63 pt team beating an 111 point squad with Gretzky)

 

[Doctor Coffin]

Yes, bad drafting (e.g. too many d-men and big forwards) and bad trades of the few good draft picks they did make (e.g., they get Vaive and Ashton in the first two rounds of the 79 draft, and squander them).

Bad player development, as well. That 1979 draft also netted them Dirk Graham, who would have been a useful addition.