It’s a framing device of Jim Rutherford’s own making: two years ago he said before the season that if everything went right, his Vancouver Canucks would be a playoff team.
That was 2023-24, when just about everything did go right and his team won the division and played a pair of pretty thrilling playoff rounds.
Last year was the opposite. Much went wrong and the team was mediocre.
So what of this 2025-26 edition?
For almost four years now, Rutherford, the Canucks’ president of hockey operations, has liked a lot about his team, but there’s clearly one thing that worries him: centre depth.
“We talked at the end of the season about getting a little more depth at centre and that I know that Patrik (Allvin) was on the phone almost daily, and either players weren’t available that he wanted, or the prices were sky high, and it did not make sense to way overpay at this point in time for a centre ice man,” Rutherford said Wednesday morning, at the Canucks’ annual pre-training camp management press conference.
Vancouver Canucks coach Adam Foote, president of hockey operations Jim Rutherford and general manager Patrick Alvin (l-r) at a pre season press conference.
“But with that being said, I think the centres we have are good, obviously if they stay healthy. If you look at our team today, compared where we were a year ago, a lot of things have improved, from our goaltending to our defence, and then we’ll see how the forwards play out.”
That will be a focus as the season goes on. How do they add to a forwards group that lost the very versatile Pius Suter over the summer and traded away Dakota Joshua. And of course they lost J.T. Miller last season, which wasn’t the plan before the season.
The Miller departure is going to hang over this team until a proper replacement emerges. That may prove to be Filip Chytil, who did play solid hockey after arriving in Vancouver in the Miller trade. But he also suffered a head injury which ended his season. Then-head coach Rick Tocchet said Chytil’s injury proved to be more whiplash than concussion, but the c-word follows around Chytil like a bad smell: he had several documented serious concussion with the Rangers and so his continuing viability will always be in question.
“If everything goes right, and as we go along, make an improvement here and there, that this team can be in the playoffs,” Rutherford said.
That search for another forward is also framed against Quinn Hughes’ future, which is going to be yet another talking point this season. Hughes has this season and next to go on his current contract, then he’d be an unrestricted free agent. He could sign an extension with the Canucks next summer, but he may want to play somewhere else in the end. Rutherford was quick to acknowledge this reality last spring, and he was asked about it again on Wednesday.
“It’s always important to win,” he acknowledged. “In this situation, we’re a little bit caught in between. How far do you go to do that? Which means, how many draft picks do you want to trade? How (much) of the future do you want to trade?”
Vancouver Canucks coach Adam Foote
Making a big move to buttress the team may not make a difference in Hughes’ assessment of where his future lies.
“He could make a decision to to go somewhere else, not related to how the team does,” Rutherford added. “You just go all in and see where it goes. I mean, so I did that when I managed in Pittsburgh, we knew we had a chance to win some cups, and that was the direction from ownership, and that’s what we did.
“We’re always going to try to improve the team and have a better team, but the first thing that Patrik hears when he calls somebody about a player is, ‘OK, no problem, we want first round pick or a couple of first round picks, or your top prospects’ and things like that.
“And that becomes the juggling act you do. (Hughes) may consider that he would prefer to be somewhere different geographically.”
This is going to be a season of talking points. We know it. Are things going right? Have they found another centre? Is Elias Pettersson back to his dominant self? Is the team defending as well as it could? How are the goalies coping?
Is Hughes going to stay?
The new hockey season is here. Let it begin.