Last night, the Minnesota Wild and Vancouver Canucks got together on the biggest trade of the season and of recent memory. Rivaled only by the three-way trade that sent Mikko Rantanen to the Carolina Hurricanes and Martin Necas to the Colorado Avalanche, the Canucks moved former Norris Trophy-winning defenseman Quinn Hughes to the ’State of Hockey’.
It’s easy to assess what the Wild gained in this trade. They’ve landed arguably one of the top three defensemen in the NHL, rivaled only by Avalanche Cale Makar and Blue Jacket Zach Werenski.
Outside of some mild injury concerns, Hughes has been dominant on a largely non-competitive team. Despite putting up some solid production through his first three seasons, he’s been dominant for the last five, scoring 50 goals and 335 points in 330 games while averaging 25:59 of ice time per night.
Unfortunately, and likely one of the motivating factors for moving on in Hughes’ eyes — the Canucks have only qualified for the playoffs twice throughout his career, with things again looking bleak this season. Although they aren’t considered in the same echelon as the Avalanche or Dallas Stars, potentially not even after this trade, the Wild have only missed the playoffs twice throughout Hughes’ career.
Still, as mentioned, Minnesota is lining up to play one of Colorado or Dallas in the first round of the 2026 Stanley Cup playoffs if they don’t fall to a wild-card spot, which may be more advantageous to them. Even though they’ve made the postseason more often than not over the last decade, the Wild haven’t reached the second round since the 2015 postseason. Time will tell if adding a player of Hughes’ caliber will be the answer to getting them over the hump.
For Vancouver, the Canucks effectively added four first-round picks for their franchise player. Marco Rossi, 24, is the oldest of the group, having been selected with the 9th overall pick in the 2020 NHL Draft. Liam Ohgren, 21, and Zeev Buium, 20, were drafted in the first round of the 2022 and 2024 NHL Drafts, respectively.
Rossi will immediately become the Canucks second-line center and will likely push Filip Chytil to a third-line role once he returns from injury. Over the last two years, Rossi has scored 28 goals and 73 points in 99 games while averaging a 47.1% success rate in the dot.
Still, Rossi isn’t far removed from a more-than-disappointing playoff performance last season. Scoring two goals and three points in six games, the Wild infamously demoted Rossi to the team’s fourth line as early as Game 2 in the team’s matchup last spring against the Vegas Golden Knights.
Meanwhile, Buium, the former National Champion with the University of Denver Pioneers, is enjoying a solid rookie campaign. Before the trade to Vancouver, Buium had scored three goals and 14 points in 31 games, averaging 18:28 of ice time per night. Despite starting 51.5% of his shifts in the offensive zone, he had averaged a 91.5% on-ice save percentage at even strength. He doesn’t project to have a similar offensive ceiling as Hughes, though he may end up being somewhat better defensively.
Lastly, Ohgren has yet to break out in any meaningful way with the Wild and may benefit from more ice time in Vancouver. Largely limited to a bottom-six role, the Swede has tallied two goals and five points in 42 games over the past two years, averaging 10:26 of ice time. However, if his AHL performance is any indication of things to come, the young center has tallied 22 goals and 42 points in his last 50 games with the struggling Iowa Wild.
Many of the grades of this trade will hinge on a few things. If Hughes signs a long-term extension with Minnesota this summer, or helps the team win its first Stanley Cup in franchise history, it will make the return haul a far easier pill to swallow. For Vancouver, if Hughes was unwilling to resign and doesn’t with Minnesota either, the trade will make a ton of sense in the long term, especially if each player reaches their respective ceiling.
Now it’s time for you to vote — who do you think came out on top?
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Easy to say Minnesota won the trade.
Let’s circle back in two years :)
Time will tell.
If he cuts himself awkwardly in the hand then VAN wins, if he goes to UFA next year VAN wins too. But if MIN reach the SC finals this year and win it next year…hmmmm
Minnesota wins for now, but Minnesota only wins the trade overall IF Hughes signs an extension this summer. If Hughes leaves after his contract ends in 2028 then Minnesota loses in the trade by not retaining Hughes but also gave up quality young talent for nothing. While Vancouver wins with a haul of young talent that could help the franchise change its trajectory in the coming future. Only time will tell as we will find it out in the next 2 years who won in the end.
This deal hinges entirely on Buium.
Last year, people were talking about him as if he’d be the next Hughes. If he’s something close to that and VAN keeps him long term in exchange for a guy who was going to walk, then VAN wins this deal (even if Hughes thrives since he wasn’t going to do it for them).
OTOH, if Buium ends up being closer to a Tyson Barrie or M.A. Bergeron, then VAN is toast for another half decade.
Harder for me to say the Wild won, in that while I think the Hughes are super fun players, I have seen no evidence that they are winning players. I don’t see Hughes lifting the Wild past the Avs.
I thought the Wild had a poor overall roster construction before this trade and now it’s worse. But, they might be able to ride their G and PP (if Hughes turbo charges it) to a run. I’m skeptical.
VAN needs to keep selling. Their culture and mix is entirely wrong. Start over.
Walzian takes.
Vancouver mainly because I don’t think Hughes will sign an extension with the Wild nor get them over the Avs or Stars.
I think arguably you have to say the Canucks did.
did they lose the best player? yes but they were going to lose him anyway in any trade.
getting 3 recent 1st rounders and an upcoming first rounder is a great haul.
now yes, Hughes could remain the best player in the deal moving forward, but the volume the Canucks got back makes them the winner here