Markus Naslund By Landon Blachford

Early Career Markus Naslund began his NHL career playing the Pittsburgh Penguins in the mid 90’s. By the time Naslund began playing for the Pens, they had put him on the third line with Marty McSorely and Doug Brown. After his second mid-season demotion to the Cleveland Lumberjacks, he began requesting trades to other teams. By the season, Naslund was traded to the Vancouver Canucks. He played his first game as a Canuck against the Dallas Stars 2 days after he was traded. He scored his first goal as a Canuck against the Calgary Flames in a 5-0 victory. In 2000 he became the first European born captain of the Canucks after Mark Messier left to return to the Rangers. This would make Naslund which would be the first of his many achievements.

With the Canucks After becoming the Canucks 10 th captain in team history he went on to start the tradition of more swedes joining the team such as Henrik and Daniel Sedin and Mattias Ohlund to the lineup.

West Coast Express Years Before the beginning of the season, Naslund signed another contract extension for 3 years. After having his old Centre Andrew Cassels replaced by Brendan Morrison to form the West Coast Express Line. This line became the main source of offensive output for the Canucks for the next 2 years, which was ended after Todd Bertuzzi was traded to Florida for Roberto Luongo and Naslund was placed with inconsistent line combinations marking the end of the west coast express.

Later years and retirement At the start of the season, naslund began to get paired with under achieving line mates almost in an almost similar scenario to his early career. His stats began to decline. By 2008 his contract had expired and he wasn’t making any deals to re-sign with Vancouver he later signed with the New York Rangers later that summer. After he singed with the Rangers he only played one season with them before he retired.

Stats and achievements Markus Naslund is the very first Swedish captain in Vancouver canucks history. In 2001,2003 and 2004 Naslund received the Viking in each of those years which goes to the NHL’s best Swedish player. Naslund was named to the all star team 3 years in a row (2002,2003,2004)

canucks team records All time goals-346 All time points-756 All time hat tricks-10 All time power play goals-114 Single season points by a left wing-104 Single season goals by a left wing-48 Single game goals-4

World junior records Most goals scored in 1 tournement-13 Medals won- 2 silver medals

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