Canucks' Best Player Emerges as Huge Surprise

One thing I enjoy about hockey is watching a player get an opportunity nobody saw coming. Sometimes it's a kid who gets called up from the minors. Sometimes it's a veteran who's been sitting on the bench, waiting for another chance. And sometimes, it's a goaltender who arrives on the waiver wire and suddenly gives a team something to think about.

That's what's happening with Leevi Meriläinen and the Vancouver Canucks.

Meriläinen wasn't supposed to be the big story in Vancouver's crease. But after only a handful of games, he's giving the Canucks something they badly need: a chance to win. His performance against the New York Islanders was another example. The Canucks struggled to control the game, gave up plenty of chances, and still had an opportunity to come away with something because their goaltender kept making saves.

That's huge for any team trying to find its way through a difficult season.

Of course, five games don't make a career. We shouldn't hand Meriläinen the keys to the crease or name him the next Roberto Luongo. The NHL is full of goaltenders who have enjoyed a terrific stretch before things got a little more complicated. Consistency is the hard part. But there's another side to this story.

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Meriläinen has earned the chance to keep getting the call in the Canucks crease.

If he keeps performing well, the Canucks have to give him that opportunity. Kevin Lankinen's past work matters, but it shouldn't guarantee him the job regardless of what's happening now. That's not how competition works. And this is where I think there's a bigger lesson.

We sometimes talk about player development as though it's a straight line. A prospect improves, earns a promotion, and eventually becomes the player everyone expected. Real life isn't nearly so tidy. Sometimes a player needs an injury, a roster change, or a chance created by somebody else's struggles before he can show what he can do.

The same thing happens away from hockey. People surprise us when they finally get the chance to do something they haven't been allowed to do before. That doesn't mean every overlooked player is secretly a star. It simply means we don't always know what someone can accomplish until we give them a chance.

The Canucks are in a season where problems will just keep popping up.

The Canucks still have plenty of problems to solve. Meriläinen won't fix everything, and nobody should expect him to. But if a waiver-wire pickup turns into a dependable NHL goaltender, that's a pretty good discovery for an organization that needs some good news.

For now, I'm happy to watch and see what happens. Sometimes the best player is the one nobody planned on. And sometimes the most interesting part of a hockey season is finding out who gets the next chance to surprise us.

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