Given that the rebuild wasn’t officially announced until partway through last season, the 2026 NHL Entry Draft was the first in a new era of Vancouver Canucks hockey. And now that we’re on the other side of it, one can’t be too displeased about the results. As far as kickstarting a rebuild goes, this was a pretty strong showing by a franchise that doesn’t always show well at these events.

The Canucks walked away from Buffalo with a number of new and exciting prospects, but their top prize was undoubtedly Caleb Malhotra, taken at third overall. In Malhotra, the Canucks landed someone who was considered the best centre in the draft. In a league where centres are always at a premium, that’s all upside.

Malhotra joins a bevy of under-23 talent already in place on the Canucks. Most importantly, he joins two top-ranked young defenders in Zeev Buium and Tom Willander at the heart of the Canucks’ new core.

All three are incredibly talented and on positive development paths. If all three were to hit on their fullest potential, the Canucks should have a 1C in Malhotra and two top-pairing defenders in Buium and Willander.

It’s a little tempting, then, to feel like the most important steps of the rebuild have already been taken.

In fact, it’s a little easy to get outright carried away with this. Malhotra becomes a 1C, Braeden Cootes develops into a 2C, and so the Canucks have their future centre arrangement already taken care of. Buium and Willander form a rock-steady, minute-eating long-term top pairing. Other young folks like Elias Pettersson, Liam Öhgren, and so on find their own long-term roles, and soon enough the Canucks have the whole upper-half of their roster sorted for the next decade or so. From here, the Canucks just have to draft some good wingers, depth defenders, and maybe a goalie, and the rebuild can be said to be done and dusted.

Easy, right?

Of course, Vancouver fans are far too familiar with disappointment to fall for this trap. Rarely, if ever, does a team have all its prospects and young players reach their fullest potential. Chances are still best that some of these players don’t quite pan out the way we’d all like them to, and that’s just reality.

But even if they all do, there’s never going to be a problem having too much talent, especially at those key positions of centre and defence. Just look at some of the rosters that made it to the Conference Finals this year. Being overloaded with talent is sort of the name of the game when it comes to competing in the modern NHL.

All of which leads us to our larger point here: the Canucks should not be done targeting centres or defenders in their upcoming drafts.

Let’s focus on the centre position for a moment. Both Malhotra and Cootes are indeed said to have top-six potential at the NHL level. Cootes seems to have a lower ceiling than does Malhotra, and most pundits agree that he tops out as a good 2C if all goes well. Malhotra, on the other hand, had some scouts split about his ultimate potential. Some still see him as a really good 2C down the road, while others think he can push that all the way to true 1C status.

No one really knows for certain. Malhotra is 18 and was just drafted a few days ago.

But there’s enough uncertainty there to say that the Canucks should probably still be looking out for an even better centre, should one become available. The 2027 Draft Class, for example, is said to be absolutely rife with high-potential centres. Grabbing another there would undoubtedly be a boon for the Canucks.

If one or more of their centres doesn’t hit their full potential, the Canucks have coverage. Betting on two-of-two centres to become top-six-worthy is tricky, but betting on two-of-three is a lot safer.

But even in a scenario where the Canucks have all three of Malhotra, Cootes, and some yet-to-be-drafted top centre all develop well, that’s still an extremely enviable position to be in. The Canucks could then roll a strong 1-2-3 punch down the middle, as they once had with Elias Pettersson, JT Miller, and Bo Horvat. Or, alternatively, they could look to trade one of them to fill out the roster elsewhere, in which case they’re now shopping around a young, top-six centre – one of the most valuable trade chips imaginable.

It’s pretty hard to find a way to make an abundance of centre talent a bad thing (previous front offices notwithstanding).

The same is arguably truer when it comes to the blueline. Buium has been considered one of the league’s top young defenders at various points in his short career, and some will attest that he has true 1D potential. Most are a little shyer with Willander and say he’s more of a top-pairing guy at his peak, which could be phrased as a 2D.

But neither are quite pacing for true superstardom as of now. Without a serious upturn or two here in the next couple of seasons, neither is probably in line for a Norris anytime soon.

Again, however, there are folks coming in the 2027 and 2028 drafts who are said to have that potential. The Canucks should probably not be done drafting highly-ranked centres, but they should especially not be done drafting highly-ranked defenders. Especially not when four are needed to fill out a long-term top-four arrangement.

The Canucks are, ultimately, beginning their rebuild in a relatively talent-poor state. They had not been accumulating picks and prospects over the recent past in the way they probably should have been, and now they’re playing a bit of catch-up.

Continuing to add premium talent at any position is the goal moving forward, but especially at those more valuable positions of C and D. The fact that the Canucks already have their best pieces in those positions really doesn’t change much, in the end.

If we can make a strong statement here, it’s this: the best thing for the long-term success of the Canucks’ rebuild would be if, as of June 2026, they had yet to draft their future top C or future top D.

Imagine if a better centre prospect and a better D prospect were added on top of that emerging Malhotra/Buium/Willander core. Now that is a rebuild to really believe in.

It’s more likely an outcome than many would think. The next few draft classes promise to be loaded up with Cs and Ds. And the Canucks promise to be in the lottery mix for at least another couple of seasons.

It’s also probably more of a necessity than many care to admit. As exciting as these opening brushstrokes of the rebuild have been, the Canucks are still a large number of pieces away from being anywhere close to on the way to contention.

Their best-case scenario is that their best picks are still yet to come.