VANCOUVER – The most dangerous workplace in B.C. on Thursday was not in the forest cutting trees or fighting fires, but in the Vancouver Canucks’ offices, where the National Hockey League team fired three highly respected senior managers.
The last embers of the Mike Gillis era were extinguished when assistant general managers Laurence Gilman and Lorne Henning and player personnel director Eric Crawford were fired by president of hockey operations Trevor Linden.
A year after Francesco Aquilini terminated Gillis as general manager, Canucks ownership is now all in on Linden and GM Jim Benning.
Gilman, Henning and Crawford had 34 years of combined service to the Canucks and were deeply responsible for shaping hockey operations under Gillis during the franchise’s longest spell of sustained excellence.