The Vancouver Canucks might have something in Nikita Tolopilo.

The 25-year-old, 6’6”, 229-pound goaltender has seemed to get better with each passing professional season. He came over to North America as of the 2023-24 season, and quickly began to steal starts away from Arturs Silovs, eventually playing more in the regular season both that year and in 2024-25 – before ceding the net to Silovs for the bulk of that 2025 championship run.

By the time the 2025-26 campaign rolled around, the team seemed comfortable dealing the now-waiver-eligible Silovs away and rolling with Tolopilo as their third-stringer behind Thatcher Demko and Kevin Lankinen, and Tolopilo’s given them no reason to doubt that decision. Through eight NHL appearances this season, Tolopilo has an even record of 3-3-0, a save percentage of .903, and a GAA of 3.22 – which doesn’t sound great, but makes plenty of sense within the context of the Canucks’ struggles.

With Demko deemed out for the entirety of the rest of the season, Tolopilo would seem to be a now-permanent fixture on the 2025-26 Canucks roster. Moreover, he’s already started to steal time away from Lankinen, hopping into the net on Tuesday against San Jose after just six minutes of play, and then keeping the net for Thursday’s win against the Anaheim Ducks.

It might take a little longer to find out exactly what they have in Tolopilo. But it won’t take much longer than the rest of the year, up to this pending summer, to know what his future is with this organization. Thanks to waivers, something the Canucks definitely have on their hands is a pending decision when it comes to their crease.

Tolopilo is currently tending net in his third professional season. That means that when 2025-26 is done, he will have run out of waiver-exemption time, and will again have to be sent through waivers to be assigned to the AHL – even during next year’s Training Camp.

Much as it was forced to do with Silovs this past offseason, the Canucks are about to be forced into either making room for Tolopilo on the big squad, flipping him to another team, or exposing him on waivers.

Of course, this decision has as much to do with the other goaltenders as it does with Tolopilo. More specifically, it has to do with Demko’s health. If Demko is going to be out of the lineup for the majority of the rest of his time in the NHL – which seems like an unfortunate, but distinct possibility – then the decision is pretty much made for them. Lankinen and Tolopilo would continue to share the crease in 2026-27, and Demko would sit on IR until the Canucks needed the cap space, and then he’d go on LTIR to give them some relief room.

In many ways, an injured Demko could become a figure much like Carey Price has been over these last few years of his contract. On the books, and technically pushing his team over the cap – thus preventing them from accruing cap space – but otherwise out of the way and relatively consequence-free due to LTIR relief.

But while that may be a likely outcome, in the end, it is not one the Canucks can count on. Demko is having hip surgery, and the goal of that appears to correct some structural issues so that he can continue his NHL career. It seems all-but-guaranteed that Demko will at least attempt a comeback, and that means that the Canucks need to be prepared for a situation in which they enter the 2026-27 campaign with all of Demko, Lankinen, and Tolopilo ready to go.

At that point, the decision becomes trickier. One option would be to roll with three goaltenders to start the season. That’s rare, and a little inconvenient, but it happens. The Edmonton Oilers are going with a three-goalie rotation since picking up Tristan Jarry, and the Vegas Golden Knights will probably be doing so soon.

Starting the season with a three-headed goaltending monster would prevent having to put Tolopilo through waivers, and it would keep him on hand to cover any potential Demko absences. But it’s a bit tough on roster management, especially with a number of skaters also having lost or soon-to-lose their own waiver exemptions, like Max Sasson. Running three goalies means running either one forward or one D short, and it also means having to cut someone extra in Training Camp.

You won’t find many in the Canucks fandom at this point who would mind a scenario in which Demko was traded. But that’s a difficult outcome to imagine. Demko is about to start a three-year, $8.5 million AAV extension with a full-NMC as of July 1, but before that, he’s undergoing hip surgery. All this, after having his third consecutive season ended early by injury.

Demko technically has no trade protection as of right now and until July 1, but there’s no avoiding that trading him without his say-so after signing an extension with a no-movement clause would be considered dirty pool by most. It is unlikely that the Canucks would consider moving Demko without his approval, and he seems to want to stay.

Moreover, however, it is tough to imagine any other team willing to take on that risk. Unless the Canucks are willing to pay someone to take on the potential cap anchor that his contract could become, it does seem like a deal the Canucks are stuck with for the time being.

Another option, of course, is to just ditch Tolopilo one way or another. The team could risk putting him through waivers, but with his size, track record, and the high likelihood that another roster has suffered a goaltending injury in the preseason, he seems unlikely to clear. The Canucks could look to flip him, but it’s unlikely they’d get anything more than the pocket change they got back for Silovs.

There’s also the question of succession. Aleksei Medvedev is the heir-apparent in the net, but he’s still 18 years old, and must be years away. Both Ty Young and Aku Koskenvuo have more question marks to them than Tolopilo, and certainly can’t be counted on quite yet. A major issue with getting rid of Tolopilo, either through trade or via waivers, is that the Canucks don’t have much of a backup plan there.

The best-case scenario might be finding a way to trade Lankinen. But that is both difficult and less than ideal. Difficult, because Lankinen will be entering the second year of a five-year extension that carries a full-NMC in the first two years and a modified-NTC thereafter. Lankinen isn’t going anywhere unless he chooses to, and given the status of Demko’s health and Lankinen’s claim to the starter position with Demko out, it seems unlikely that he wants to go anywhere.

We’ll have more on a potential Lankinen market in a subsequent piece, but he will remain in the driver’s seat no matter how many suitors arise.

It’s also less-than-ideal to leave the crease entirely to Demko and Tolopilo, because that could very quickly turn into leaving the crease entirely to Tolopilo. As well as he’s played, no one is looking to have him take over as the every-night starter as of next season, and that would be an unfair burden to place upon him.

Goaltending crises and the Vancouver Canucks go together like green eggs and ham. And, as per usual, there are no easy or perfect answers here. Just a tricky choice, to be made soon, and without the benefit of any real certainty.

Until then, all someone like Tolopilo can do is keep playing as well as possible, so as to make the decision about his future even more difficult to make.