LATEST | Former Canucks coach Bruce Boudreau makes a promising statement on the team's star Elias Pettersson

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Felip Gosselin
August 25, 2023 (7:36 PM)

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The Canucks' management team opted for a coaching mid-season which led to Rick Tocchet taking over from Bruce Boudreau. It's well known that the experienced coach Boudreau was quite fond of the Canucks' number 40.

Boudreau took the mic today to discuss the Canucks, and when asked about Pettersson, Boudreau gave a response that reveals a lot about Pettersson's character:

''When we would play Edmonton, he would say put me against McDavid...I think he's got as much drive as anyone I've seen.''

The interview continued and led to Boudreau dropping a bombshell regarding the two parties' contract negotiations. It was revealed earlier during the off-season that Pettey might hold back his contract talks until Auston Matthews signed his.

On Wednesday, Matthews inked a massive four-year deal with a $13.25M cap hit. Asked to compare Pettersson's impact to the Matthews effect in Toronto, Boudreau gave an extremely promising statement and pointed out precisely why the Canucks can't drop the balls on EP40:

''Boudreau mentioned that Pettersson is as important to the Canucks if not more than Matthews is to the Leafs because Canucks don't have the supporting cast like the Leafs have.''

The Swede was excellent in 2022-2023 and put up a career-high 102 points. As he's pointed out on various occasions, he's only hoping to break that score an establish new highs for himself. Can he prove once again that he's more valuable to the Canucks than Matthews is to the Leafs?