The Vancouver Canucks have made a change to their coaching staff moving on from long-time assistant Jason King.
The Vancouver Canucks announced a change to their coaching staff on Friday when they moved on from long-time assistant Jason King. The 41-year-old had been a holdover on the staff when Rick Tocchet replaced Bruce Boudreau in mid-January. In fact, King worked under three Canucks head coaches having joined Travis Green's staff first in Utica of the American Hockey League in 2016 and then joining the big league bench staff in Vancouver in 2020.
Over the past two seasons, King had been in charge of the Canucks power play. The team finished 11th in the NHL with the man-advantage this past season scoring 62 times on 273 opportunities (22.7%). The Canucks were one of four teams in the NHL that did not convert with a two-man advantage all season despite six opportunities and 4:19 of 5-on-3 time.
With the likes of Quinn Hughes, Elias Pettersson, JT Miller and Andrei Kuzmenko, the Canucks certainly appear to have the component parts in place to have a power play that should sit higher in the league rankings. Despite scoring 39 times and registering 102 points, Pettersson managed just six power play goals this season and getting him more touches of the puck with the man-advantage seems like it would benefit the hockey club.
King had strong ties to the Canucks organization having been selected by the team in the seventh round of the 2001 draft. He played parts of two seasons in Vancouver and is best remembered for his time on the Mattress Line (a king and two twins) spent on the wing with Daniel and Henrik Sedin.
Moving forward -- barring any further changes -- the Canucks will have Tocchet along with Adam Foote, Mike Yeo and Sergei Gonchar behind the bench. They also have the Sedins on the development staff and on the ice regularly at practices. It's possible their insight will be sought to help guide the power play next season.