Voting has closed for the 2024 NHL All-Star Game but Vancouver Canucks fans won’t know which Canucks will be joining Quinn Hughes as All Stars until Saturday when the voting results are announced.
As many as four more Canucks — J.T. Miller, Elias Pettersson, Brock Boeser, and Thatcher Demko — could be among the 12 roster spots voted by fans to give the Canucks five players a the All-Star Game. That would be the first time in franchise history they’ve ever had more than three players at the All-Star Game.
But fans don’t have to wait until Saturday to know that the Canucks will have at least one more representative.
With a 28-11-3 record, the Canucks currently sit on top of the Pacific Division standings whether you go by points or points percentage. They sit six points clear of the Vegas Golden Knights, who have played the same number of games, and 11 points clear of the Los Angeles Kings, who have four games in hand.
As pointed out by Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman, that means Rick Tocchet will be one of four head coaches at the NHL All-Star Game.
The coaches for the All-Star Games are not selected by anyone but are instead the head coaches from the teams in each division with the best points percentage. Tocchet’s Canucks lead the Pacific at All-Star selection time, so he’s heading to Toronto at the beginning of February for the All-Star Weekend.
It’s an appropriate midseason honour for the odds-on favourite to win the Jack Adams Award as the NHL’s coach of the year.
Tocchet has led an incredible turnaround for the Canucks, helping to take them from mediocre to a measuring stick. Other teams now treat games against the Canucks as a test and, more often than not, those teams are failing that test.
While there are a number of things that factor into the Canucks’ resurgence, coaching has undeniably played a massive role. The Canucks' coaching staff has gotten the most out of not only the team's stars but also their depth and Tocchet deserves all the accolades that are coming his way.
