While he may not be the centrepiece of the trade, Marco Rossi is the centre piece the Vancouver Canucks have been looking for since the summer.

The Canucks had reported interest in the Austrian centreman in the summer. In fact, talks went as far as the Minnesota Wild offering Rossi to the Canucks in exchange for Aatu Räty, Arturs Silovs, and the 15th overall pick (Braeden Cootes) in the 2025 NHL draft. To which the Canucks rejected.

Amid those trade rumours, we’ve taken an extensive look at Rossi and whether the Canucks should bring him into the fold to fill the top-six centre void. The answer was unequivocally yes. Given what the team had down the middle and not planning to pay the price to retain Pius Suter, Rossi was the best available option on the trade market.

So, let’s take a look into Marco Rossi and what Canucks fans should expect from the newly acquired forward.

Rossi is a 24-year-old, left-shot centreman, drafted by the Wild ninth overall in the 2020 NHL Draft. Standing at 5’9″ and 182 lbs, fans could be skeptical of his size and durability to play down the middle. However, Rossi plays much bigger than his size would suggest.

The Austrian forward plays bigger than his frame, and isn’t afraid to throw his body when he has to and gets into the dirty areas for puck retrievals on the forecheck. Rossi has a high hockey sense to read defencemen on the forecheck and intercept passes.

Rossi’s hit totals aren’t high, but he finished with 63 in 82 games last season – nearly doubling his totals from the year prior. And through 17 games this season, he’s on a similar pace to his totals from last year with 11 hits.

And although he’s missed the last month with an injury, otherwise, Rossi has been a very durable player.

He missed the 2020-21 season after developing myocarditis after suffering complications with COVID-19. The following year, Rossi spent most of the season with the Iowa Wild of the AHL, where he scored 18 goals and 53 points in 63 games. He split the following year with Iowa and Minnesota, before becoming an NHL regular in 2023-24.

Rossi played a full 82-game season, scoring 21 goals and 40 points. And then followed that up by setting new career highs in goals (24), assists (36), and points (60) in another 82-game season. He did most of that playing in a top-line role between Kirill Kaprizov/Matt Boldy, and Mats Zuccarello. However, once the playoffs came around, Rossi was demoted to the fourth line, where he averaged just 11 minutes per game.

He appeared to have fallen out of favour with the Wild due to his size. But when they could not find the right return for him, they extended him to a three-year, $5 million AAV contract in late August before training camp. Through 17 regular season games this season, Rossi has four goals and nine assists for 13 points, while averaging 18:06 minutes of ice time.

Now, let’s take a deeper dive into how Rossi is offensively, defensively, and some traits that come with playing the centre position at the NHL level:

Rossi brings pretty much exactly what you’re looking for when it comes to a second-line centre. He proved he could produce 60 points in this league last season, which is steady point production for the role. And he can do it in various ways.

He’s not a one-dimensional playmaker; he can also score goals for the team. Now, he doesn’t have the best shot, but he makes up for the lack of a heavy shot with precise shot placement. And he has to be able to place it well, as shown by his shots on goal map on NHL Edge.

As you can see, 67 of Rossi’s 136 shots on goal came from the net front. That’s nearly 50% of his total shots coming from that in-tight area. So being able to elevate the puck in tight areas is critical to actually beat NHL goaltenders – as you will see him capitalize on in the highlight package below.

However, Rossi doesn’t have that true elite shot. He doesn’t always beat goaltenders from distance.

Of the 24 goals Rossi scored last season, 18 of them came from the high-danger areas in front of the net. Two from the side of the net, and four from a bit more distance, but did not score off a shot from the perimeter.

So, he’s not a true sniper, but he can pot a few goals in the greasy area in front of the net. Rossi isn’t categorized as a playmaker or play driver, either. However, his passing is still a strong suit, as he picked up 36 helpers last season.

On the power play, Rossi often set up in the net-front/bumper spot in Minnesota. However, according to Canucks power play line rushes at Saturday’s practice, Rossi was playing on the half-wall opposite of Garland.

Canucks Head Coach Adam Foote had high praise for Rossi’s work on the power play at his first practice:

“We just saw him on the power play; every time the puck touched his stick, and I know it was just practice, but it was the right decision. Whether it was shooting for a stick, finding the right lane, not making a saucer pass if you don’t need to. He’s a smart hockey player.”

Though more of an offensive player, Rossi has developed his defensive game since beginning his NHL career.

After playing no more than nine minutes of penalty kill time in any of his first four years of his career, Rossi has been averaging over a minute of shorthanded time per game this season.

Analytically, Rossi is well above the 50% threshold for key 5v5 on-ice metrics. This season with Rossi on the ice, the Wild controlled 55.8% of expected goals, 54.39% of the scoring chances, and 60.2% of high-danger chances at even strength. Now, could this be a result of playing with top-offensive play drivers in Kirill Kaprizov/Matt Boldy? Perhaps, but Rossi’s job on that line is to play the defensive centre role, which he’s done based on the numbers.

But in Vancouver, he won’t have the luxury of playing with elite talent such as Kaprizov or Boldy on his wing. So we will see whether Rossi can continue to bring that part of his game to the Canucks.

In his draft year, EliteProspects had this to say regarding Rossi’s defensive play:

“He’s responsible defensively with great off the puck positioning and support below the hashmarks.”

In the faceoff dot, Rossi has been servicable, but not fantastic.

Of the top four Wild centremen this season with over 100 faceoffs taken, Rossi’s 48.6% ranked second on the team. Joel Eriksson-Ek was the go-to faceoff taker for the Wild with nearly 700 draws – 300 more than the next Wild centre.

All in all, Rossi loses more faceoffs than he wins. However, Rossi has improved in the dot over the years since becoming an NHL mainstay.

Through the last three seasons, Rossi went from 44.73% in 2023-24 (749 faceoffs taken), up to 46.77% in 2024-25 (992 faceoffs taken), and has crept up to a career-high 48.64% through 17 games in 2025-26.

Looking at the centre depth as it stands, Rossi’s 48.64% would rank third on the Canucks, behind Aatu Räty (59.26%) and David Kämpf (58.23%), but ahead of Elias Pettersson (47.76%) and Max Sasson (39.75%). His ability will help the Canucks in the faceoff dot.

Speed isn’t necessarily Rossi’s game. It takes him a while to get up to speed, but once he does, he can excel past defencemen.

Going back to NHL Edge, we can see just that.

He hit his top speed of 22.81 MPH in an overtime game against the Utah Hockey Club. However, that was his only speed burst over 22 MPH all season. And that is reflected this season as well. Rossi has just one burst over 21 MPH, but that was 21.73 MPH. So, he has the rare fast burst, but at the end of the day, he is often not a burner.

In watching the highlight clip below, Rossi can pick up enough speed to get behind defenders and pick his spot with his shot – which we referenced earlier.

Rossi is a top-six centre, undoubtedly and is going to help the Canucks down the middle of the ice for years to come. And while he’s not the main piece coming back to Vancouver in the Quinn Hughes trade, his impact at the centre ice position and the forward group will be a massive upgrade on what the Canucks were currently icing. When everybody is fully healthy, pairing him with a playmaking, play-driving winger like Conor Garland seems like an ideal way to get the most out of Rossi, given his skill set and what he brings on the ice.