Goalie Kevin Lankinen suffers the tough reality of the Vancouver Canucks 2024-2025 season

The Vancouver Canucks' 2024-25 season has now officially come to a close and it's safe to say it's going to be an interesting offseason for Patrik Allvin & Co., with several big decisions on the horizon.

Before taking a look to the offseason and what the team plans on doing, Rick Tocchet's group had some business to take care of last night at Rogers Arena and unfortunately, an injury forced Kevin Lankinen out of the game.

With the score knotted up at one goal a piece through 40 minutes, the Vancouver Canucks took to the ice for the final frame looking to give the home fans something to cheer about heading into the offseason.

However, as the team stepped onto the ice, there was no sign of Finnish goaltender Kevin Lankinen as rookie Nikita Tolopilo, who made his NHL debut on Monday, was between the pipes to start the third period.

Shortly after the third period began, Brendan Batchelor of Sportsnet shared on social media that Kevin Lankinen left the game due to a muscle strain and, obviously, wasn't going to return.

After all the success that Kevin Lankinen had this season and his path to getting to Vancouver, it sucks to see that an injury is the way he closes out his first year as a Canucks.

Lankinen joined the Vancouver Canucks on the eve of training camp in September due to Thatcher Demko's injury, which he suffered in the playoffs last year and kept him out until early December.

The Helsinki, Finland native took on the starting reigns immediately and impressed the fan base and just a couple months after his Canucks debut, set a new NHL record after starting the season with a 10-0-0 record on the road.

His strong play for Vancouver earned him a five-year contract extension, which he signed with the club just after the 4 Nations Face-Off in February.

Lankinen finished the season with a 25-15-10 record in 51 games, along with a 2.62 goals against average, a .902 save percentage and four shutouts.

As we head into next season, it's going to be very interesting to watch the goalie battle in training camp and who will get the nod in net for their opening game of the 2025-26 campaign.