The Canucks have nine players eligible for unrestricted free agency this summer and they won’t be able to afford bringing them all back so they’ll have to prioritize who they want to try to keep around. To that end, team president Jim Rutherford told Sportsnet’s Iain MacIntyre that forward Dakota Joshua is one of their priorities to keep around. The 27-year-old is in the midst of a breakout year that has seen him set new career highs offensively, notching 15 goals and 13 assists in 57 games along with 221 hits. A late-bloomer who wasn’t even a full-time regular until last season, Joshua has been a nice bargain for Vancouver, playing on a deal with an AAV of just $825K. It will likely take three times that amount or more to keep him around for 2024-25 and beyond.
More from Vancouver:
- One way they could try to save money to keep their UFAs around would be to spend less on their backup goalie position. Thomas Drance of The Athletic outlines (subscription link) how Vancouver could deploy Arturs Silovs next season, either as the outright second-stringer to Thatcher Demko or by shuffling him back and forth between AHL Abbotsford to take advantage of his waiver exemption. Silovs is a pending RFA whose next contract shouldn’t be much higher than the minimum salary while current backup Casey DeSmith is a pending UFA and is likely heading for a raise on his $1.8MM AAV.
- Conor Garland is still a long way from retirement but the 28-year-old is already thinking ahead to his post-playing days. In an interview with Postmedia’s Ben Kuzma, Garland indicated that he wants to “coach more than anything” and has coached at some tournaments in past summers. He has bounced back relatively well this season after being prominently featured in trade speculation, notching 16 goals and 24 assists through 76 games, numbers that are close to last year’s despite a dip in playing time to 14:19 per night.
- Prospect Daimon Gardner has entered the NCAA transfer portal, reports Brad Elliott Schlossmann of the Grand Forks Herald (Twitter link). The 20-year-old center was a fourth-round pick by Vancouver back in 2022 (112th overall) after a dominant showing at the high school level. He averaged over a point per game in 2022-23 in the USHL before making the jump to college this season. However, his role was quite limited with Clarkson as he had just a goal and five assists in 29 appearances, resulting in him landing in the portal.