The Off Season Begins: Tiny Tweaks or a Complete Restructure for the Canucks?

The Vancouver Canucks season and Stanley Cup hopes came to a sudden end on Sunday evening. The planned cup parade was sidetracked by Darryl Sutter and his youthful band of Los Angeles Kings. How could this happen? The Vancouver Canucks were practically shoe-ins to make it back to the Stanley Cup final after falling short last year. Yet, a lack of cohesiveness on both the offensive and defensive end and an inept scoring punch provided Vigneault's boys a chance to get a head start on securing early tee times this spring. Yet, while Canucks players will be on golf courses across the continent, the team's brass have some colossal decisions ahead of them this summer. Over the coming days, I'll go over each of these conundrums over the next few days. We start at the top with Mike Gillis!

FIRE MIKE GILLIS?

Some will demand that Mike Gillis be fired for his handling of the Cody Hodgson fiasco at the trade deadline or his inability to properly improve last year's team by adding more punch and grit. Let there be no question that Mike Gillis certainly holds a lion's share of the blame in the team's early exit. After all, as he mentioned in during his press conference on Tuesday, Gillis is the primary decision maker for the organization when it comes to hockey operations. So, if mistakes were made in constructing the "right" type of team, they are Gillis' mistakes.

That being said, the players still play the game. Let's not forget that Gillis (with a little help of Brian Burke and Dave Nonis before him) has constructed a 2-time President's Trophy team, that was one game away from winning the Stanley Cup. Critics will say that the President's Trophy is a meaningless accomplishment, but if the Canucks' plan is to build a healthy and powerful organization in the mold of Ken Holland's Detroit Red Wings, regular season consistency is required. Gillis has helped to put the Canucks on the map as a perennial Cup contender. Even legendary Canucks coach and GM Pat Quinn was not able to do that in his tenure with the team.

Feeling the heat from the media & fans

Despite this year's colossal disappointment, Mike Gillis has built a Western Conference power. Any turnover at the GM position at this point in time would undoubtedly be a step backwards, as a new GM would bring in his own people and style of play to the organization. All of this would take patience, something that Canucks' fans are quickly running out of. 2012-13 will be a make or break season for Gillis' Canucks, so, expect Gillis to enter next year without a contract extension. The team will need to produce and avoid their annual slow start, or otherwise the Aquilini family will be looking for a new President and GM around the end of 2012.