Vancouver Canucks captain Bo Horvat says missing the playoffs in 2021-22 simply isn't an option.
"I've been on the team, this will be my eighth year coming up, which is crazy. And I want to be in the playoffs," Horvat told The Athletic's Thomas Drance.
"I don't want to go through the motions in the regular season and be done in April," he added. "I want to be playing in the playoffs, it's the best time to play, it's when I find I take my game to the next level.
"And I think we have the team here to get there. We just have to prove it now. Enough is enough, we can talk all we want, at the end of the day we have to go out there and prove it on the ice."
The Canucks advanced to the second round of the playoffs in the bubble in 2020, snapping a four-year postseason drought during a run that ended with a seven-game defeat to the heavily favored Vegas Golden Knights. However, Vancouver didn't build on that momentum in 2021, finishing last in the North Division with a 23-29-4 record.
Injuries and a significant COVID-19 outbreak factored into Vancouver's struggles last year, and now the club has made several roster changes this summer in an effort to return to the postseason.
The team brought in Oliver Ekman-Larsson, Conor Garland, Jason Dickinson, and Tucker Poolman while moving out Nate Schmidt and several veterans with cumbersome contracts.
There's still plenty of heavy lifting for general manager Jim Benning to do before the puck drops in October, as Elias Pettersson and Quinn Hughes are restricted free agents who need new contracts.
