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Canucks need to put nationality aside and select the best players in 2026 NHL Draft
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Photo credit: © Kirby Lee-Imagn Images
Jacob Fraser
May 31, 2026, 09:00 EDTUpdated: May 31, 2026, 02:34 EDT
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The 2026 NHL Draft is less than a month away. The Vancouver Canucks currently hold four picks in the top 41 of this year’s draft. Many Canucks fans want to see their favourite team enter this new era led by the Sedins and Ryan Johnson, targeting players with a high level of compete and a good culture fit for the team’s future. 
It’s definitely the way this group should lean toward to kickstart their rebuild. That being said, there are some hang-ups among many fans regarding these prospects’ nationalities, particularly with Swedish players. Unfortunately, for fans who care about the nationality of their draft picks, this year is the year of the Swedes. 
Currently, there are five to seven Swedes who could find their way into the first round of this year’s draft. Ivar Stenberg, Viggo Björck, Malte Gustafsson, Elton Hermansson, Alexander Command, William Hakansson and Marcus Nordmark all have a high likelihood of hearing their names called in the first or early in the second round of the draft. 
We understand. The Canucks, in recent years, have taken some swings on Swedish players who have a ton of upside, but maybe don’t fit the mould of a prototypical ‘playoff performer’. 
But we need to look at this objectively; the majority of these prospects named above, for lack of a better term, have that dog in them. 
Let’s start with Stenberg and Björck, both of whom spent the majority of their season in the Swedish Hockey League, playing top-line minutes and being used in all situations. The pair also represented Sweden at the World Juniors this year, winning a gold medal, along with playing on the top line for the men’s team at this year’s World Championships. 
Maybe you don’t think Björck’s the guy for the Canucks at third overall, but he projects as a very impactful centre at the NHL level and is perhaps the best centre in this year’s draft. 
Stenberg, however, is arguably the best player in this year’s draft. If he’s available for the Canucks at three, that should be a no-brainer. 
When it comes to the other two wingers, Hermansson and Nordmark, they are the two that have all the skill in the world, but the compete level is questionable at times. If that’s the case, sure, take them off the draft board. They wouldn’t be in consideration at three, of course, but if you want to go a safer route with that 24th overall pick, maybe these two aren’t your guys. 
Command, however, should be without a doubt a target for the Canucks with their 24th overall pick. He projects as a middle-six centre that has a ton of upside both offensively and defensively and is easily a top-five centreman in the 2026 class. 
The two defencemen, Gustafsson and Hakansson, are both left-shot, so maybe there’s less of a need there for the Canucks. Still, both are big bodies, good skaters, with Gustafsson projecting as a very solid second-pairing guy, while Hakansson projects more as a shut-down third-pairing defenseman. 
This isn’t at all to say the Canucks should take four Swedes with all four picks. But this team has so many needs, and the targets for each pick should be the best player available. If the best player available at each pick happens to be Swedish, then great, take them. 
I get wanting the homegrown players to cheer for, but at the same time, it’s about building the best team possible to compete for a Stanley Cup. The easiest way to do that is through the draft, taking the best players possible, no matter where they’re from. 
This franchise has deep Swedish roots, and some of the greatest Canucks of all time hail from Sweden. Henrik and Daniel Sedin, Marcus Naslund, Thomas Gradin, Mattias Öhlund – we could go on.
This year’s draft marks the start of a new era; the Canucks are rebuilding, and it’s time to put the bias against the past regimes and their decision-making to bed and allow the new regime to make its own decisions and build this team as they see fit.
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