Evander Kane signs in Siberia, Ben Hutton scores a goal assisted by Bo Horvat… in 2026

Welcome back to Canucks Notebook, the series on our website where we highlight Vancouver Canucks stories you might have missed!

Last week, Evander Kane’s agent Dan Milstein revealed that the 35-year-old winger would be signing a contract in the KHL after going unsigned through NHL free agency.

“We had a couple of things here in North America, but in the end, Evander decided to take his talents to Russia. We’re very close to signing a deal with a KHL team. Over the next couple of days or so. We will make an announcement, but he will be playing this season in Russia at the KHL level,” Milstein said on an episode of Daily Faceoff Insider Edition.

On Tuesday morning, KHL club Sibir Novosibirsk announced that they had signed Kane to a one-year contract. Sibir has won just eight of their 26 games so far this season, and currently sit last in the KHL’s Eastern Conference standings. Sibir play out of Novosibirsk, Russia, the third-largest city in the country, located in southwestern Siberia.

The Canucks, of course, were Kane’s last NHL team, as they acquired him from the Edmonton Oilers ahead of the 2025 NHL Draft, sending away a fourth-round pick (the same pick they acquired from Edmonton in the Vasily Podkolzin trade). In 71 games with the Canucks last season, Kane scored 13 goals and 18 assists for 31 points, logged 92 penalty minutes, and averaged 16:25 minutes of ice time.

There’s a headline you probably haven’t expected to read in at least a decade.

I mean, even when they were both with the Canucks, seeing Ben Hutton score a goal assisted by Bo Horvat was a rarity. In fact, it only happened one time, back on November 8, 2018, when the Canucks took down the Boston Bruins in an 8-5 barn burner in Boston. Nikolay Goldobin picked up the other assist on the goal, which came at 8:28 of the second period, for those curious.

And on Monday night, Horvat assisted on a Hutton goal for the second time, with both players now members of the New York Islanders.

We hope you enjoyed this trip down memory lane. I know I did.