The Vancouver Canucks may not have moved out any players on trade deadline day but they'll still have a slightly different look as they face the Minnesota Wild on Friday night because of a trade they made the previous day.
With Carson Soucy traded to the New York Rangers, Vittorio "Victor" Mancini will step into the lineup on the third pairing. General manager Patrik Allvin specifically noted the emergence of the team's young defencemen, including Mancini, made it easier to move Soucy.
"We felt the competition that we have created here was not a guarantee that Carson would be in the lineup every day," said Allvin. "A conversation with his agent over a couple of weeks led to this decision for us yesterday."
That opens up a big opportunity for Mancini, especially with Noah Juulsen unavailable for the rest of the regular season after a reported hernia surgery. It's an opportunity of which he's hoping to take full advantage, as he aims to help the Canucks push for the playoffs.
"I know I can play tough, hard, physical defence," said Mancini after the morning skate. "Contribute to that second layer of offence as well. Playoffs is something that I've really been looking forward to. As a kid, that's what you dream about."
Mancini has only played one game with the Canucks since the trade and it came on the road. He said he was definitely looking forward to playing at Rogers Arena for the first time.
"I really like Vancouver as a city," he said. "I've been able to go out and visit some things and walk around and get to know the city a little better. Really excited to get to know it more and get to know the home crowd as well."
I also asked Mancini about his name, as he's officially listed as Vittorio Mancini by the NHL. That is his full name, he said, but he's always gone by Victor, though he was clearly very proud of his full name.
"I'm named after my great grandfather on my dad's side," said Mancini, then added with a grin: "Very Italian. They always called him 'Victor' too, growing up."
Vancouver Canucks projected lines
Based on how the Canucks skated at their fully-attended morning skate on Friday, expect to see the same lineup against the Wild that you saw against the Anaheim Ducks on Wednesday, just with Mancini in for Soucy.
Here are the Canucks' projected lines:
Brock Boeser scored his first career goal in his first career game in Minnesota against the Wild, which was extra special because he is from Minnesota. In total, Boeser has 3 goals and 10 points in 17 career games against the Wild. He'd surely like to improve on those numbers and perhaps the comfort of knowing he'll be staying in Vancouver at least through the end of the season will give him some peace of mind and help him perform at his best.
The Canucks' starting goaltender will be Kevin Lankinen, who bounced back from a bit of a shaky performance against the Seattle Kraken with a strong game against the Anaheim Ducks on Wednesday, though it certainly helped that the Canucks only gave up 16 shots on goal.
Minnesota Wild projected lines
Like the Canucks, the Wild were quiet on trade deadline day because they made their moves ahead of time. They acquired Gustav Nyquist from the Nashville Predators on March 1 for a second-round pick, then got Justin Brazeau from the Boston Bruins on March 6 for Marat Khusnutdinov, Jakob Lauko, and a sixth-round pick.
Here are the Wild's projected lines, courtesy of The Athletic's Michael Russo:
Gustav Nyquist - Ryan Hartman - Matt Boldy
Marcus Johansson - Frederick Gaudreau - Mats Zuccarello
Marcus Foligno - Marco Rossi - Vinnie Hinostroza
Yakov Trenin - Devin Shore - Justin Brazeau
Jake Middleton - Brock Faber
Declan Chisholm - Jared Spurgeon
Jon Merrill - Zach Bogosian
Filip Gustavsson
Marc-Andre Fleury
The Wild's starting goaltender will be Filip Gustavsson, who has been very good this season with a .914 save percentage in 41 starts. He made 30 saves on 32 shots in his last start against the Canucks back in December, a 3-2 overtime win for the Wild.
