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Vancouver Canucks place Chris Tanev on IR, recall Mike Zalewski from Utica
October 27, 2016, 4:38 PM ET [331 Comments]
Carol Schram
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The Vancouver Canucks hit the ice on Thursday for a full, vigorous practice at Rogers Arena.

This blog's going up later than usual today because I was at that practice. Stay tuned for an Erik Gudbranson feature coming up next week, when the Canucks have three days off before they start their first Eastern road trip of the year.

For today, player personnel deployment was the same as what we saw during Tuesday's loss to the Senators.




There were a couple of roster moves by the team this morning. First, add one more name to injured reserve:




Second, another forward gets called up:




Mike Zalewski is the 24-year-old college free-agent signing from the Mike Gillis era, who has logged five games of NHL experience with the Canucks in two different seasons. Last year, he picked up one assist in the three games where he dressed in a Vancouver uniform, and he has one assist in his first five games with the Comets this year.

With back-to-back games against two tough opponents, Edmonton and Washington, this weekend, I think it's a good call to have an extra body handy in case anybody else gets banged up. Tanev and fellow injured players Derek Dorsett and Alex Burrows were all at the rink today. Zalewski doesn't appear to have arrived yet, and I didn't see Anton Rodin.

Ben Kuzma of The Province reported on Wednesday that Rodin's prognosis seems to be getting grimmer by the day.

After experiencing pre-season swelling in his surgically repaired knee from a January tendon laceration, the winger was placed on injured reserve to start the season. The hope was that he would return stronger and faster to bolster the offence, but even that isn’t going as planned. Rodin isn’t skating and is on a four-to-six week strength program.


It was nice to see Nikita Tryamkin on the ice today, though he continued to skate as part of the extra defense pair with Alex Biega. To my eye, he looked like he was moving effectively through the drills—with his size, he's a hard guy to miss out there!




Emerson Etem did clear waivers this morning, so the Canucks decided not to take that contract once again, even though he could have been assigned to Utica if they'd re-claimed him. Two more interesting names on the wire today:




Both players were highly touted in their draft years but haven't been able to stick at the NHL level.

Paajarvi was drafted 10th overall by the Edmonton Oilers in 2009 and has bounced back and forth between the NHL and the AHL throughout his career, including as recently as last season.

McIlrath is a big defenseman who was drafted 10th overall in 2010 and has been a 'project' for the New York Rangers ever since. Last season, he played just 34 games and spent numerous nights in the press box in order to protect him from the waiver wire; today, the Rangers took the chance on trying to send him down.

McIlrath's pretty tough, but I'm not sure his mobility is good enough for him to be a potential upgrade for the Canucks, especially not in the top six.

Finally, to wrap up today—Canucks prospect Rodrigo Abols has found a home!


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