Vancouver Canucks Head Coach Rick Tocchet Sends Harsh Message to Nils Höglander

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Maverick Mitchell
November 3, 2024 (12:45)

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Vancouver Canucks head coach Rick Tocchet is not afraid to speak his mind, or call out his players in the media, but this time, he is doing it in a much more subtle, but just as effective way, and Nils Hoglander must not be too pleased.

It is no surprise that Rick Tocchet runs a tight ship with the Canucks, no matter how well you play, he can easily praise you with more ice time just as fast as he can take it away, and we are seeing that as we speak Hoglander.

Coming into the 2024-2025 season, Hoglander was slotted to play in the top-6 forward group, especially after he had a career season last year. But, as we have seen, Hoglander has slid down to the bottom-6, playing the majority of his time on the 4th line, which is coming across as a harsh message from Tocchet.

Should Hoglander play in the top-6 for the Vancouver Canucks?

As of right now, Rick Tocchet must love rookie prospect Arshdeep Bains as he is getting a ton of ice time on the top line with J.T. Miller and Brock Boeser, but this might cause issues for Hoglander.

Last season, Hoglander scored 24 goals and 12 assists for 36 points in 80 games, which might not sound super impressive in total, but to score 20+ goals is no easy feat in the NHL. On top of that, there are basically no 20+ goal scorers that play on the 4th line, and Tocchet must have a reason for it.

Tocch has already been vocal about not liking Hoglander's game when he was up with the top lines back when they played against the Carolina Hurricanes on October 28th.

One of those that got split up as the night went on was the trio of Elias Pettersson, Conor Garland and Nils Hoglander and they weren't used much at 5-on-5 in the first two periods. "We'll obviously when you change it, you don't like it right? So I didn't like a couple of things there. Didn't like Hoggy [Hoglander] at all....listen, I'm not going to pick on that line. I just felt that I wanted to make a couple of changes." Tocchet said.

The only explanation for not have a young, 24 goal scorer with the top lines and getting sufficient ice time is that Tocchet doesn't trust Hoglander against the other teams' top lines 5 on 5. But for whatever reason he has, Hoglander will have to show a lot more to gain back the trust of the head coach.