Mark Burke -

The Loui Eriksson Era is over in Boston.

After months of negotiations that in the end really never got anywhere, there is a "strong likelihood" that forward Loui Eriksson will not re-sign with the Bruins and instead sign with the Vancouver Canucks, according to Darren Dreger of TSN.

Dreger says that confirmation of the signing will come after the 12:00 p.m. window opens to officially usher in free agency.

General manager Don Sweeney has been in consistent contact with Eriksson and his agent J.P. Barry since February trying to hammer out a deal that both sides could agree too. That never came to pass, as Sweeney wanted to keep the length of the deal at four-years while Eriksson and Barry knew all along they could secure a contract at either five or six-years on the open market. It was a staring contest for five months and neither side blinked, and now they’ll both just shake on it and go their separate ways.

It took two years for Eriksson to really gain a foothold in Boston following the Tyler Seguin trade, and in his third year he put up 30 goals and 63 total points. Eriksson is a fantastic all-around player and does a lot of things really well, however locking-up the soon-to-be-31-year-old on a five or six year deal at $5 million per-year or more is something the Bruins could not afford to do.

Are you glad the Bruins didn’t extend themselves to retain Eriksson?