Team

Betting

CanucksArmy has no direct affiliation to the Vancouver Canucks, Canucks Sports & Entertainment, NHL, or NHLPA

CA’s top 20 Canucks summer prospect rankings: #13 Kieren Dervin

Photo credit: © Tav Morisson-CanucksArmy

By Jacob Fraser

Jul 23, 2026, 16:00 EDTUpdated: Jul 23, 2026, 13:26 EDT

Comments

We’ve reached number 13 in the CanucksArmy collective top 20 Vancouver Canucks summer prospect rankings. Today’s prospect has been difficult to get a read on since being selected by the Vancouver Canucks.

Kieren Dervin

Falling two spots since the mid-season rankings, Dervin hasn’t dropped as much as some of the other prospects who have already been listed in our top 20 rankings. That being said, he remains difficult to judge based on his level of production in the OHL.

The Canucks selected Dervin in the third round of the 2025 NHL draft after he had played a large majority of his season at St. Andrew’s College, a prep school in Ontario. Dervin played 61 games at St. Andrew’s but finished the season in the OHL, playing 10 regular-season and 11 playoff games with the Kingston Frontenacs.

The production through those 10 games, as well as the 11 playoff games, wasn’t anything that jumped off the page. Despite the lack of scoring, the Canucks took a bet on his versatile two-way game.

This season with the Frontenacs, Dervin finished with 17 goals and 25 assists for 42 points through 53 games. Once again, the point totals don’t scream future NHLer, but Dervin was heavily relied upon in all situations for Kingston. In what was technically his first season in the OHL, Dervin was used on the penalty kill and powerplay and was a big part of the team’s offence, finishing second in team scoring.

Kingston was a team that struggled to produce offensively this year, so that makes the 42 points in 53 games more impressive than what they look like on paper individually, especially considering the time that Dervin missed due to injury.

This coming season, Dervin is headed to the University of Michigan. After one season in the OHL, being relied upon heavily, he’s now making the jump to the NCAA, where it’s expected that his role will take a fairly significant hit. Michigan already has a pretty loaded forward group, so we can likely expect Dervin to be a bottom-six player on this Michigan team, who may see some limited penalty-kill and power play time, if at all.

Although his role will diminish, this is a great place for Dervin to continue to develop his game. To have a future in the NHL, he needs to work on his physicality. Dervin is a high-IQ player at both ends of the ice. Offensively, he has a lot of skill and does well to attack defenders, while having the ability to create for himself all over the ice rather than sticking to the perimeter.

Defensively, he’s smart as well, typically in the right spots to disrupt plays. He’s also very good at creating turnovers and starting breaks, creating offence off the rush.

He’s a smart, creative player with a lot of the tools to be successful at the NCAA level. That being said, he’s going to need to get stronger, and although he plays a competitive style, he needs to add more aggression to his game to have success at the next level.

Michigan will be a great place to hit the gym, with access to some of the best facilities in college hockey, helping him develop that part of his game both on and off the ice.

Projection

Ceiling: The ceiling is difficult to predict with Dervin. The lack of production can be a bit of concern as far as saying Dervin could have an NHL future, but the intangibles point to a player that at their absolute best could become a contributor in the NHL. As of right now for Dervin, the ceiling likely projects to being a bottom-six forward in the NHL. Someone who can contribute on both ends of the ice and can be relied upon to give you solid minutes on any given night. Whether that’s on the wing or down the middle is up for discussion given his faceoff struggles, but either way, there certainly could be a future for Dervin with the Vancouver Canucks.

Floor: The floor for Dervin is a lot easier than the ceiling projection. At his floor, there is certainly a future AHLer who plays all situations and impacts the game at both ends of the ice.

ETA: Dervin is still a fairly raw prospect, so putting a definitive ETA on when he’ll make the jump may not be fair. The expectation, however, would be at a minimum two seasons in the NCAA, playing a smaller role this season, and then in his second year hopefully getting an increased opportunity to further develop his game.