The Vancouver Canucks blue line, led by Filip Hronek, still has real pieces, but this rebuild will test whether it can survive without forward support.
This season, that group runs deep. Hronek, Zeev Buium, Jamie Oleksiak, Tom Willander, Luke Schenn and Elias Pettersson all figure into the mix.
There's real size in that group, and there's real puck movement too. On paper alone, this isn't a bad blue line by any stretch.
The concern isn't talent. It's chemistry. Good defensemen get exposed fast on teams where the forwards don't work in sync with them.
Leave two defensemen without centre support, or without a winger digging pucks off the wall, and even skilled pairs start eating minuses in a hurry.
Hronek still put up 49 points last season, 8 goals and 41 assists over all 82 games, but he also finished at a minus-23 rating.
Why Vancouver's young forwards hold the real key here
Willander posted a similar story as a 21 year old, 21 points over 70 games, also landing at a minus-23. Those numbers track straight back to five-man support, not individual play.
Buium, still just 20, put up 26 points over 76 games but finished at a minus-33, the steepest number anywhere on this blue line.
Oleksiak and Schenn round out the group with steadier, quieter numbers, giving the pairings real size and experience up and down the lineup.
This blue line isn't the problem in Vancouver. It's whether a young forward group can actually learn to support it fast enough to matter.
The quicker this group grasps what the coaching staff is teaching as a five-man unit, the better every pairing on that back end is going to look.
Whether that chemistry shows up early in the season or takes all year to click is the real question hanging over this rebuild.
Is the Canucks' blue line good enough to carry this rebuild if the forwards struggle?
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