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JPat’s Monday Mailbag: Is the Canucks training camp roster essentially set?

Jeff Paterson's weekly Vancouver Canucks mailbag.

By Jeff Paterson

Aug 10, 2026, 10:00 EDTUpdated: Aug 9, 2026, 10:27 EDT

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We have officially entered the realm of parsing snippets of video of Vancouver Canucks players taking to the ice for summer workouts.

Over the past week, Elias Pettersson was seen skating in Los Angeles, while scenes of Thatcher Demko hitting the ice in Vancouver also surfaced. It won’t be long now until the entire team is together, gearing up for training camp, which is now just five weeks away. To help get you a little closer to the start of the hockey season, we offer up another edition of the Monday mailbag.

Any more rumoured signings of significance left for the Canucks? It has been a little quiet lately and wondering if current roster will be training camp roster.

— pNak 🇨🇦 🃏 (@pnak3000.bsky.social) 2026-08-01T17:38:52.009Z

I certainly am not expecting the Canucks to be active on the free agent market between now and the middle of September. But that doesn’t mean they couldn’t pull off a surprise. If they felt they could sign a free agent to a one-year deal with an eye to flipping him at the deadline, I wouldn’t be totally opposed. But the Canucks did well not to enter into deals with significant term on July 1st, so I don’t see that changing as they close in on camp. As for their own players, the Canucks are free to extend a number of pending restricted and unrestricted free agents. Young players Zeev Buium, Liam Öhgren, Jonathan Lekkerimäki, Aatu Räty and defenceman Elias Pettersson are all entering the final year of their current deals. On some levels, it’s a little surprising that there hasn’t been traction with any of those players. And with the September 15th deadline pending to sign players to eight-year deals, we’ll see if there is some movement over the next month. For the most part, I believe what you see is what you’ll get when camp opens. But the last management group seemed to love making trades around camp – Casey DeSmith, Sam Lafferty, Erik Brannstrom, Noah Juulsen, and Riley Stillman were all acquired on the eve of camp or just before the start of the regular season. We’ll see how this new management group navigates the process of setting its first opening-night roster.

ColdTakesOnSports

@ColdTakesPNW

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Replying to @patersonjeff

With a familiarity with Malhotra and getting out of Footes system, what can Victor Mancini be for the Canucks if anything?

8:00 PM · Aug 1, 2026

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I don’t know. And even if I did, why would I spill that news here? Don’t people want to be surprised when they show up at Rogers Arena for the first time? With all due respect (and you get plenty of respect from me for your Andre the Giant avatar), anyone who knows me knows that arena playlists are not my jam. I am always amused by how much energy is devoted to grumbling about music choices at sporting events. Now, to each their own. Some people are into concession options, others fixate on fan noise, and some really pour themselves into what comes out of the sound system. You do you. But I lose absolutely no sleep pondering what song the Canucks will walk out to or what music will be played when they score. And I really don’t care whether each player gets their own goal song. Call me a killjoy. Say I’m no fun. All of that may be true. My personal recommendation would be to completely overhaul whatever they used last season. Nothing seemed to work for the Canucks on home ice. So let’s blame it all on the musical selections and turn a page.

There’s something to be said about playing in a place where you’re wanted. And the Canucks made it abundantly clear that they coveted all the intangibles the 34-year-old brings with him when they traded for him in late June. The Canucks are trying hard to create a new culture, and Gallagher is a guy with strong ties to the area, having grown up in Delta and playing a starring role for the Vancouver Giants. He is familiar with the market and understands the assignment. He’s here to lend his veteran presence to a team in the early stages of a rebuild. It’s impossible to know at this early stage just how much ice time he’ll get. But he averaged a career-low 12:21 last season on a good Montreal team that effectively phased him out. After January 1st, Gallagher’s ice time dropped to 11:50 per game. So while he’s not likely to be a leading man with the Canucks, it’s quite possible he’ll see more ice time here than he did last season with the Habs. And if he’s got his eye on a contract beyond this expiring one, interested teams will have the book on Gallagher. He has nothing left to prove at this stage of his career.

Let's talk MoUs.Without the city losing patience and going all Eminent Domain, what is there actually room for at this proposed location? Can the team get physio/video/offices in there?Can they add a town-friendly sweetener like commercial or residential space getting included in the build?

— Erin Butler (@eleighbutler.bsky.social) 2026-08-01T03:39:14.321Z

The reaction to the recent joint announcement by the Canucks and the City of Vancouver entering into a Memorandum of Understanding to explore adding a new building at the current site of the Britannia Community Centre probably didn’t get the reception either the team or the city was hoping for. It sounded progressive, but really the proposal amounts to a new building attached to the existing sheet of ice at Britannia. The tower would house a Canucks locker room, players’ lounge, gym and medical area, along with some new office space for the city to use. It barely meets the threshold to be considered a modern-day practice facility. It’s better than nothing, and it’s certainly more than they’ve got right now. But it almost feels like the two sides floated this proposal as a trial balloon to see how it would go over. Clearly, minor hockey clubs in the city have objected to the lack of any new sheets of ice in the plans. And that’s fully understandable. There is a much larger parking lot on the Britannia site that could accommodate a second sheet of ice. It’s time for the bright minds behind this project to get creative. Build a new rink with commercial and community space above it. Or build those on the ground level and put the new sheet of ice above them. The Washington Capitals practice facility includes twin sheets and sits above a parking garage attached to a shopping mall. It’s time for decision-makers to think outside the box and figure this project out. Everyone – the Canucks, the community stakeholders and the city at large – deserves better than a small addition to an aging rink.

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