While it’s been a decade of darkness on the ice, the Vancouver Canucks have had a few bright spots when it comes to the National Hockey League Draft. It stands to reason, considering the Canucks have selected in the top 10 in four of the past 10 drafts and will again next week.

Looking back at the past 10 drafts overall, it’s been a mixed bag for the Canucks. Here is a ranking of the team’s top 10 draft choices over the past 10 years. These are ranked in terms of what these players have accomplished in their time in the NHL and graded against where they were selected in their respective draft classes. Obviously, not all players have played all of their games with the Canucks despite being drafted by the organization.

Quinn Hughes (7th overall in 2018)

Sure, Quinn Hughes doesn’t play for the Canucks any longer. But he is easily the best draft pick the team has made over the past decade and will likely stand the test of time as one of the best draft choices the club has ever made. It’s a shame the organization was unable to do more to surround Hughes with a stronger supporting cast during his time in Vancouver; however, it also became abundantly clear that the game-breaking defenceman didn’t want to commit long-term to the team or the city. It’s all water under the bridge now. This past season saw many in the market sour on Hughes in the aftermath of his exit. But draft day 2018 will remain a great day in franchise history when a talent like Hughes dropped to the Canucks.

Elias Pettersson (5th overall in 2017)

Yes, the past two seasons have been a struggle, but nabbing Elias Pettersson with the fifth overall pick in 2017 was a huge win for the Canucks. A memorable goal in his NHL debut, 10 goals in his first 10 NHL games, Rookie of the Year and a 102-point season on his resume make Pettersson one of the team’s top picks of all time. All these years later, he still leads his draft class with 508 points (one more than Cale Makar). Just imagine how wide that gap would be if Pettersson had shown even flashes of his former self over the past two seasons. Recency bias likely leaves many seeing the flaws in Pettersson’s game rather than the supreme skill he put on display in those early years. But he’s easily the second-best draft pick the team has made over the past 10 years.

Nils Höglander (40th overall in 2019)

Only 13 players from the 2019 draft class have scored more NHL goals than Nils Höglander. That’s pretty remarkable considering Höglander has produced a total of 10 goals over the past two seasons. In fact, 24 of the 60 goals he has scored in his career came in the 2023-24 campaign, which is now looking like an outlier. Overall, Höglander is 18th in point production from his draft class. It hasn’t felt like it for a while now, but Höglander has played the part of a second-round steal for the Canucks. To find that kind of value, 10 picks into the second round makes Höglander the team’s third-best selection of the past decade.

Elias Pettersson (80th overall in 2022)

Just four years removed from being a third-round pick, the ‘other’ Elias Pettersson has already logged 98 NHL games and solidified an everyday spot on the Canucks blueline. He’s the definition of good value mined from a mid-round selection. For context, no one else taken in the third round of the 2022 draft has played more than 15 NHL games. It will be interesting to see where Pettersson’s career goes and how much more growth there is in his game, but right here, right now, he qualifies as a shining example of a draft-day win for the organization.

Arturs Silovs (156th overall in 2019)

Dustin Wolf, Spencer Knight, and Pyotr Kochetkov are the only goalies taken in the 2019 Draft that have logged more NHL games than Arturs Silovs. And none has played more Stanley Cup Playoff hockey than the likeable Latvian. Not bad for an unheralded sixth-round draft pick who also has a Calder Cup and an AHL Playoff MVP award on his resume. A victim of the numbers game in Vancouver, Silvos now plies his trade in Pittsburgh and looks like he should be part of the Penguins’ goaltending plans for a while. Regardless of where his career goes from here, Silovs has already yielded incredible value for a player taken as deep in the draft as he was.

Vasili Podkolzin (10th overall in 2019)

It’s taken him longer than expected, and obviously, it took a change of scenery, too, but Vasili Podkolzin has finally arrived in the NHL. He had a breakout 19-goal season in Edmonton and was a point-a-game player in six playoff contests for the Oilers. Add to that the fact that he’s been remarkably durable and has not missed a game in his two seasons in the Alberta capital. It looked like his development had stalled in Vancouver, and the Canucks were too quick to give up on the player. The Canucks passed on the likes of Matt Boldy and Cole Caufield, who were taken shortly after Podkolzin, and that is certainly haunting them these days. For his part, Podkolzin will likely never live up to the expectations of a 10th overall selection. Still, he is now looking like the all-situations contributor he was projected to be.

Jonah Gadjovich (55th overall in 2017)

That is two-time Stanley Cup champion Jonah Gadjovich, to be precise. And he’s two franchises removed from the club that selected him with one of two second-round picks back in 2017. Slow to launch as an NHL’er, Gadjovich has clearly found a home with the Florida Panthers, where he has spent the past three seasons. It’s easy to look now as the Canucks chase toughness and wonder why they didn’t do more to develop one of their own draft picks. But injuries have always been an issue with Gadjovich, who has never dressed for more than 43 games in a single NHL season. Still, he’s managed to carve out a role for himself and has a couple of championship rings to prove it.

Tom Willander (11th overall in 2023)

The hope is that Willander will climb quickly in subsequent versions of this list. But with just 70 NHL games under his belt after his rookie season, his body of work needs to be beefed up. There is plenty of promise for the smooth-skating right-shot defenceman, as there should be for anyone selected 11th overall in his draft class. Willander certainly didn’t look out of place in his freshman season, but he needs to get stronger to improve his in-zone defensive coverage and win more of his one-on-one battles. It will be fascinating to see his progress in his second season now that he’s got a baseline for defending the best players in the world. He is tracking to be the kind of player the Canucks were hoping he’d be when they took him just outside of the top 10 three years ago.

Jonathan Lekkerimäki (15th overall in 2022)

Four years after selecting him in the middle of the first round, the Canucks are still waiting for Lekkerimäki to solidify himself as an everyday NHL player. The shot is undeniable, and he has shown flashes of being able to put it to good use at the highest level. But the bottom line is the 21-year-old (he turns 22 next month) has appeared in just 37 NHL games and managed to score only five big-league goals. Coming off a season shortened by shoulder surgery, we’ll see what Lekkerimäki does to secure a full-time job in the NHL next fall. There is certainly a spot in the top six for him if he can be a consistent goal-scoring threat. He’s been a dangerous goal scorer at every stage of his journey. But he needs to prove it in the NHL, and this feels like a big season for him.

Hunter Brzustewicz (75th overall in 2023)

Peddled away before he had a chance to prove himself as a Canuck, Brzustewicz settled in and played 34 games for the Calgary Flames last season. He scored twice and added five assists. Only Denver Barkey (PHI) and Nick Lardis (CHI) have played more NHL games among players taken in the third round three years ago. So Brzustewicz seems to be on the right path. He was one of two third-round selections the Canucks made that year. Sawyer Mynio is the other, and he’s still looking to make his first NHL appearance. It certainly appears Canucks scouts did their job with Brzustewicz; however, he turned out to be part of the price paid to bring Elias Lindholm in at the trade deadline in 2023.

Honourable mention: Braeden Cootes (15th overall in 2025)/Kirill Kudryavtsev (208th overall in 2022)/Ty Mueller (105th overall in 2023).

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