Vilmer Alriksson headlines a group of 11 players the Vancouver Canucks cut from their preseason roster on Monday.
The winger was the only name in that group who actually saw preseason game action, playing 9:11 in Saturday's loss at Seattle.
He made it count too. Four hits in limited minutes is the kind of number that gets noticed in a crowded camp.
Alriksson, Gabriel Chiarot, Anri Ravinskis, Aku Koskenvuo and Ty Young are all headed to AHL Abbotsford.
Five more names on professional tryout contracts, Austin Brimmer, Bennett Schimek, Joe Arntsen, Tim Rego and Gavin White, were released and will join them there.
Lucian Bernat, the club's sixth-round pick this year, gets sent to his junior team after missing the Prospect Showcase entirely.
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That's the paper trail. What it means is Vancouver just tightened the group heading into a stretch that decides real jobs.
Three prospects just cleared the toughest hurdle in camp
Braeden Cootes, Adam Novotny and Brooks Rogowski all remain on the 46-man roster, and that's not nothing this early in September.
Camp is a numbers game before it's anything else, and surviving the first cut buys these three more film in front of Manny Malhotra's staff.
The Canucks are 0-1-0 in the preseason after Saturday's 2-4 defeat in Seattle, currently riding a one-game skid.
They're back at it Tuesday on the road against Calgary, and every shift left on the schedule matters more than the last.
Four exhibition games total means the next trim could come fast, and it won't be gentle.
Thatcher Demko, Kevin Lankinen and Chris Driedger remain among five goaltenders still in the mix, a crowd that has to thin eventually.
Up front, names like Elias Pettersson, Filip Chytil and Jake DeBrusk sit safely on that group, but depth behind them still has real fat to trim.
Nobody gets comfortable in this league in September. Ask any player who thought a strong training camp was enough and got the call anyway.
Vancouver's front office didn't blink on the tryout players, and that's the part worth watching. Camp bodies rarely get a second look once they're released.
The next cutdown lands after Tuesday's game in Calgary, and for guys like Cootes and Rogowski, every rep between now and then is an audition that doesn't pause.
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Should the Canucks have kept a bigger camp roster before Tuesday's game against Calgary?
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