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InGoal Magazine’s Kevin Woodley said on the radio Wednesday that he’s not expecting Demko will be ready for the start of Vancouver Canucks training camp next month in Penticton
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Published Aug 21, 2024 • 3 minute read
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Thatcher Demko may have had some sort of surgical procedure done at some point this summer Photo by Candice Ward /Getty Images
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Another day, another discussion of Thatcher Demko’s status before the 2024-25 NHL season.
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Wednesday morning on Sportsnet 650, InGoal Magazine’s Kevin Woodley echoed what has been whispered behind the scenes but no one has been able to confirm, that the Vancouver Canucks’ No. 1 goalie may have had some sort of surgical procedure done at some point this summer.
But more crucially, Woodley indicated he doesn’t expect Demko will be ready to start training camp in a month’s time in Penticton.
Sportsnet’s Iain MacIntyre later reported on X that the team “officially still expects Thatcher Demko to be ready for regular season.” But it’s hard to get any answers out of the team’s braintrust right now on what they might be thinking about the status of Demko, who hurt his knee early in the playoffs and never returned — though he appeared nearly ready to return to action when the Canucks were eliminated in the second round of the 2024 Stanley Cup playoffs by the Edmonton Oilers.
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Still, if there’s a question about Demko being ready for training camp, it thus makes sense why the Canucks have apparently been calling around to see if there are any veteran goalies who would be willing to join the Canucks’ training camp on a professional tryout — otherwise known as a PTO. (Players on PTOs get per diem, a hotel room, team meals and insurance, but draw no salary.)
CHEK-TV’s Rick Dhaliwal first reported that the Canucks have been making discreet inquiries and Postmedia has confirmed his report.
A player on a PTO is looking to either impress the team they’re with or another NHL club and win a contract for the coming season. That scenario has obvious appeal for a skater, given how much more flexibility teams have in their rosters, but for a goalie, that’s hardly appealing; teams don’t tend to go into the regular season, let alone training camp, without a clear and obvious depth chart, ready for a multitude of contingencies.
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There are just two goalies currently without a contract who played more than 20 NHL games last year: Kevin Lankinen and Antti Raanta. (There’s also Martin Jones, but Woodley reported Wednesday he believes Jones has retired.)
Lankinen was a solid backup for the Nashville Predators the last two seasons so it’s a bit of a surprise he’s without a contract. You assume he’s still holding out hope there’s a team that would be interested in committing to him for a full contract.
Raanta fell down the depth chart last season for Carolina and struggled with an injury later in the season; he might be the kind of player who would accept a mere PTO opportunity.
There’s a handful of other goalies with NHL experience without contracts at the moment who can conceivably be targets as well, like Malcolm Subban, Alex Stalock, Aaron Dell, Dustin Tokarski and Michael Hutchinson, but again, the incentive to be a PTO goalie is small.
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Even if they don’t recruit a goalie to help out in training camp, if Demko becomes a question mark to start the season, what the Canucks can definitely lean on is that there will be goalies available at the end of training camp via waivers. Detroit, for instance, will have four waivers-eligible goalies in camp this year — Ville Husso, Cam Talbot, Alex Lyon and Jack Campbell — and they’ll have to cut at least one, likely two, at the end of camp; Buffalo has three NHL goalies under contract, presumably they’ll waive the experienced James Reimer at the end of camp, with Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen and Devon Levi expected to be their NHL duo this season; and in Winnipeg Eric Comrie will likely be on waivers too.
pjohnston@postmedia.com
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Courtesy : https://theprovince.com/sports/hockey/nhl/vancouver-canucks/canucks-thatcher-demko-may-not-be-ready-for-2024-training-camp-report