4 NHL Players Comparable to Canucks’ Braeden Cootes – The Hockey Writers – Vancouver Canucks

There’s a good chance that Canucks fans will be getting to see quite a bit of Braeden Cootes this season. The 2025 15th-overall pick had a brief stint with the team to start last season, but was re-assigned to the Western Hockey League, where he split the season between the Seattle Thunderbirds and Prince Albert Raiders. Because he’s expected to have a major role with the team in the near future and says he feels ready to make the team, many fans may be wondering what they’re getting from Cootes.

Cootes is known to be more of a defensively sound player than a pure offensive producer. With that said, he’s been lauded for his high-energy game, making things happen all over the ice through hustle and a great ability to read the play. These kinds of players may not be franchise cornerstones, but they are often crucial to Stanley Cup-winning teams. Here are four players who gave their teams what Cootes may bring to the Canucks.

Phillip Danault

Perhaps the most fitting comparable for Cootes is Montreal’s Phillip Danault. Both players are known for having relentless motors and high hockey IQs, with strong fundamentals that help compensate for their lack of electric straight-line speed. Danault has largely made a career out of being a dependable middle-six center who, in his prime, was able to slot in on a top line if it was needed.

If you look at how Danault was discussed as a prospect, you will see a lot of similarities with Cootes. His QMJHL coach described him as a “tremendous worker,” saying that “he has the admiration of every single one of his teammates just on how hard he works.” This mirrors the scouting reports of Cootes, as in The Hockey Writers’ draft season report on him, writer Dayton Reimer said, “Cootes’ work ethic is infectious. He has an unrelenting motor and no matter the score, he never stops pursuing the puck and pushing the play.”

While Danault in 2026 isn’t much of a scorer, he wasn’t bad offensively at the peak of his powers at all. His best scoring marks were 25 goals and 54 points, with these being achieved in his first couple of seasons with the Los Angeles Kings. You can argue that Cootes has a higher ceiling than Danault, as his offensive skillset could allow him to outscore the Canadiens centre. However, if the Canucks got a player of Danault’s caliber out of the 15th overall pick in 2025, there certainly wouldn’t be any complaints.

Anthony Cirelli

Another excellent defensive center Cootes could be on the road to becoming similar to is Anthony Cirelli of the Tampa Bay Lightning. Cirelli was kind of an unsung hero for the Bolts for their back-to-back Stanley Cup championships at the beginning of the decade. He reached another gear following these wins, becoming a regular 20-goal scorer and a two-time Frank J. Selke Trophy finalist. While not flashy, Cirelli is a coach’s dream, as he excels in doing all the little things that lead to success on a nightly basis.

Cirelli is a winning player who became a household name and member of Team Canada not because of an overwhelming offensive toolkit. Cootes has plenty of both the physical abilities and the intangibles to become a Cirelli-like player; it’s up to the Canucks to put him in a position to show this.

Zach Hyman

In THW’s draft season profile of Cootes, he was compared to Edmonton Oilers forward Zach Hyman. While Hyman has played at the wing for his entire career and Cootes was drafted as a centre, they share plenty of similarities in what they bring to a team.

Hyman is similar to Cootes, known for his work ethic. He has a solid skill set, but lacks the impressive highlight reel or signature move that leads to scoring. Still, he put up a 50-goal season in 2023-24 and followed that up with 16 goals in that postseason. These are superstar numbers, ones that even the Oilers, who believed in him enough to give him a seven-year deal, probably never would’ve imagined. He did this while also being a defensively responsible player, as he has earned a few down-ballot Selke Trophy votes over the years.

Many might hand-wave Hyman as a fair comparison because he gets to play next to Connor McDavid. Even if prospects like Caleb Malhotra become proper first-line players, they likely won’t be able to elevate a player into 50-goal territory. Still, if Cootes can get to the net like Hyman and can showcase his ability to hustle around the ice, he could be capable of becoming one of the team’s top goal scorers.

Brayden Schenn 

Brayden Schenn of the New York Islanders was a player that NHL Central Scouting senior western scout John Williams compared Cootes to right before he was drafted in an interview with NHL.com. 

“He can play in the middle, he can play on the wing.” Williams was quoted as saying. “I saw him play both this year. Highly competitive. … High IQ, competitive two-way guy who can play anywhere up and down your lineup.”

Schenn has been a solid producer with every team he’s played for (except for the Los Angeles Kings, as he only played a total of nine games there.) He has been very versatile throughout his career, moving between centre and wing and excelling for stretches at both. There were times when his teams called upon him to be a star, such as in his first season with the St. Louis Blues when he scored 70 points. He was at his most valuable when he became more of a supporting piece, like in the Blues’ Stanley Cup-winning run in 2018-19.

Schenn may not be the flashiest comparable player, but he’s been a solid contributor in the NHL for a long time, which is what you want from a first-round pick.

Becoming Braeden Cootes

When Cootes begins to break out in the NHL, soon he won’t be viewed as another version of successful players in the past. He will develop his own role and may soon be a benchmark comparable for young, up-and-coming two-way centres. For now, though, these players provide realistic outcomes for Cootes if he develops properly.

Also of note, we previously published comparable player articles for the Canucks’ 2026 first-round draft picks, Caleb Malhotra and Adam Novotny.