Canucks’ Quinn Hughes Trade May Be the Best Thing to Happen to Them – The Hockey Writers – Vancouver Canucks

There is a funny thing about rebuilding a hockey team. The move that looks like the beginning of the end can sometimes turn out to be the beginning of something much better. That may be what eventually happens with the Vancouver Canucks and Quinn Hughes.

Right now, it is easy to look at the Hughes trade as the moment Vancouver said goodbye to one of the best defencemen in franchise history and wonder what the organization was thinking. That’s understandable. Hughes was the captain, the star and the player who gave the Canucks a certain identity every night. But hockey history is full of trades that can’t really be judged until the kids coming back the other way grow up.

Here’s Where the Canucks Rebuild Could Get Interesting

Zeev Buium is now the most obvious piece of the puzzle. Vancouver just gave the 20-year-old defenceman an eight-year contract worth $9.38 million per season. That’s an enormous commitment for somebody with only 76 NHL games under his belt. But general manager Ryan Johnson isn’t buying Buium for what he is today. He’s buying what he believes Buium will become three, four and five years from now. That’s an important distinction.

Buium isn’t alone. There is Tom Willander, another young defenceman who could eventually form part of an extremely interesting blue-line pairing. There is Liam Öhgren. Jonathan Lekkerimäki is trying to put his injury problems behind him. Braeden Cootes and Caleb Malhotra are coming. Adam Novotny is another name for down the road. Then there’s Elias Pettersson, who is still young enough to become part of the next version of this team.

The Canucks Have Lots of Young Talent Moving Through the Organization

Suddenly, many young players are moving through the same organization at roughly the same time. That doesn’t mean they’re all going to become stars. They won’t. That’s how hockey works.

Some prospects develop faster than expected. Some take longer. Some might never quite make it. But the Canucks appear to have something they haven’t always had: enough promising young pieces that they don’t need every one of them to hit a home run.

Perhaps the most encouraging part is the way Johnson is talking about developing them. He doesn’t want these young players sitting quietly in the back of the room waiting for their turn. He wants them to learn from veterans and, eventually, become leaders themselves. Here’s where Luke Schenn, Jamie Oleksiak, and Brendan Gallagher become so important.

Sounds Like a Simple Canucks Plan, Doesn’t It?

Young players need good examples. They need veterans who understand what it means to prepare every day, handle adversity, play through mistakes and conduct themselves properly when things aren’t going well. Johnson spent much of the summer bringing in experienced players for precisely that reason.

So perhaps the Canucks aren’t simply building a roster. They’re trying to build a culture. That’s where I think the Hughes trade could eventually take on a completely different meaning. Maybe the trade wasn’t the moment Vancouver lost its identity. Maybe it was the moment the organization finally decided that its next identity would have to be built around a different generation.

What Can These Young Canucks Prospects Become in the Future?

The interesting question isn’t whether Buium can replace Hughes. He can’t. Nobody should be asking a 20-year-old to do that. The question is whether Buium, Willander, Öhgren, Lekkerimäki, Cootes, Malhotra, Novotny and the other young players can grow together into something different.

Give them three or four years. Give them veterans who teach rather than simply occupy roster spots. Give them enough time to make mistakes without deciding every mistake means the rebuild has failed. Then let’s see what this looks like.

Maybe it works. In fact, call me optimistic, but I think there is a reasonable chance it works very well. The Canucks don’t have to become a contender overnight. They simply have to keep adding pieces until one day everybody looks around and realizes that the kids aren’t kids anymore.

Will Canucks Fans Eventually See the Hughes Trade Differently?

The Quinn Hughes trade might be seen as the moment the new-look Canucks became a possibility. That’s when the Hughes trade might be remembered differently. Not as the day the Canucks gave away their franchise defenceman. But as the day they finally made room for the next one.