NHL Insider Calls out Vancouver Canucks Superstar Elias Pettersson After Horrible Start to the Season

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Tom Banks
October 19, 2024 (10:48)

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Elias Pettersson has been very poor early on in the 2024-25 season, and now one NHL Insider revealed what exactly is going on with the Vancouver Canucks superstar.

Last season, the Elias Pettersson and the Vancouver Canucks were one of the NHL's best teams during the regular season, and given how deep this team was, plenty of players in the lineup had career years. One player that had another great campaign was Elias Pettersson, who ended the year with 34 goals and 89 points, but the back-end of his season wasn't as hot as the first half of the year.

In his past 34 games, Pettersson has exactly 0 goals at 5v5, with just one total goal in his last 11 regular season games to end 2023-2024. With just one assist through four games this season, many are asking what's wrong with the man affectionately known as 'EP40.'

There could be many reasons for this major drop-off in production. He could be dealing with things in his personal life, injuries that haven't been disclosed, or other distractions. According to Sportsnet's Justin Bourne, he's simply not there mentally right now:

"Not being in the right mental place right now". - Justin Bourne

So far no one in the organization has expressed any worry about Pettersson, as it could simply be he is in a slump right now (something he's gone through before) but given the lack of effort and energy we've seen through four games, it's something to keep a very close eye on. It's always alarming when one of your top superstars goes through a slump, but there is something drastic about this drop-off so far. It feels like Pettersson is trying to play with too much of a chip on his shoulder, and it's costing him. Feeling too much pressure can either whip you into shape or drain you of your resources and it seems like Pettersson is feeling the latter right now.

This could mean many different things for the 25-year-old star but after Pettersson recorded 13 points in his first eight games last season, to now having just one assist through four games; something is clearly wrong with the star forward. There are still 78 games left of the regular season, and there's plenty of time for his offense to start falling into place again, but if Pettersson's struggles remain beyond the 10-15 game mark, it may be time to worry about the former first-round pick.