The Vancouver Canucks may have found their next best duo at the tail end of the 2025-26 season.

In a season full of losses, player struggles, and trades, the Canucks have been constantly rotating their forward lines in hopes of finding pairings that stick. At first, it was the Abbotsford Canucks line of Arshdeep Bains – Max Sasson – Linus Karlsson that sparked early. Then the Jake DeBrusk – Aatu Räty – Drew O’Connor starting picking up steam. But lately, it’s been the Liam Öhgren – Marco Rossi – Brock Boeser line that has shown some strong chemistry that has been translating to the scoresheet of late.

Throughout his entire Canucks career, Boeser has shown he can develop chemistry with high-quality centremen. It all started with Bo Horvat, then Elias Pettersson, but he’s most known for playing his best hockey on a line with JT Miller. But since Miller was traded, he hasn’t been able to re-find that spark with another centreman.

The Canucks tried to revive the Pettersson and Boeser duo, but with Pettersson’s play dipping over the last two seasons, they haven’t been able to find that buzz. This resulted in the two playing on separate lines, leaving Boeser to play with the likes of Filip Chytil (when healthy), David Kämpf, Max Sasson and Aatu Räty as his centremen. And no offence to those guys, but they aren’t the top-six quality centremen that Boeser performs best with.

Now, as a result of the Quinn Hughes trade, Rossi and Öhgren were brought to Vancouver.

It was a bit of a slow start for Rossi with the Canucks. Through his first eight games, he picked up just one goal and one assist before he suffered another lower-body injury that kept him out until after the Olympic break. But once he returned, Boeser has been stapled to his right wing.

But it wasn’t an immediate spark between the two. Through the first three games together, they were unable to connect on a goal together. However, something clicked in their fourth game against the Carolina Hurricanes, when the two connected on a cross-crease pass on a 5-on-3 power play.

Rossi spoke following the Hurricanes game about how it’s been playing with Boeser since they were put together:

“Tonight was pretty good. Even games before, maybe we have scored but I think we find each other a lot. We just have to keep going and the bounces are going to come.”

And Rossi was right: the bounces did eventually come.

Fast forward to March 12’s game against the Nashville Predators, when Rossi and Boeser both deflected a Filip Hronek point shot to open the scoring.

Their line contributed to all three of their goals, with both Rossi and Boeser picking up assists on Hronek’s game-tying goal with a minute remaining.

“It’s clicking game by game,” Rossi said postgame. “You know, the chemistry is coming. It’s important. Everybody brings something different to our line, and that’s the key.”

The following game was tough for the Canucks as a whole, but Rossi and Boeser still managed to hit the scoresheet after a poor Jamie Oleksiak turnover in the final minute of the game. But they picked up where they left off against the Panthers on Tuesday, with the duo assisting on a pair of Pettersson power play goals and truly putting their chemistry on display late in the first period.

Öhgren does a phenomenal job at hounding the Panthers player along the wall and shovels the puck down low along the boards. Boeser picks up the puck, does a quick shoulder check to see that Rossi is left all alone at the net front, and fires a behind-the-back pass to Rossi, who goes forehand, backhand, forehand and puts the Canucks back up by two.

Boeser spoke postgame about how his line has come along as of late and what’s working well for them:

“I think [Rossi’s] just getting more comfortable with our systems,” Boeser said. “You know, kind of sticking with the same linemates is helping. I thought our first few games together – me, him and Liam – weren’t great. But the last few we’ve been a lot better at creating chances and reading off each other. I think the chemistry is coming.”

Head Coach Adam Foote was asked what he’s seeing from the new line he’s put together:

“They’re starting to get some rhythm together,” Foote shared. “They’re communicating well together, and they’re getting better. You know, coming back to our end, Liam’s really gotten pretty solid with that. Boes has always been pretty smart that way. It took a few games for Marco to learn the structure, but it’s probably the last thing to go. Tracking back is the last thing to get, coming in a little bit quicker, staying above guys. So, he’s really been doing better at that as well.”

Through the previous three games, the duo’s chemistry has translated to on-ice production. Rossi is currently riding a three-game goal streak, totalling seven points over that span, while Boeser has one goal and five assists for six points in that stretch.

As the team transitions toward a rebuild, there will be a lot of changes coming to Vancouver, but the fact that two presumed players who will be sticking around for said rebuild are starting to develop chemistry is a positive sign for the future of Canucks hockey.