Canucks News & Rumours: Stenberg, Malhotra, Sharks Need & Trading Up

That changes the equation at the top of the draft. If Toronto takes Gavin McKenna first overall, Ivar Stenberg will be sitting there at second. But San Jose might decide organizational need matters more than pure rankings and grab one of the big defencemen instead — Chase Reid, Carson Carels, Keaton Verhoeff, or Alberts Smits. If that happens, Vancouver could end up staring at one of the elite forwards in the class anyway.

Right now, Canucks fans shouldn’t get too gloomy about falling to third. Sometimes draft boards break in funny ways.

Item Two: The Canucks Have Real Options at No. 3

Now comes the really interesting part. What exactly do the Canucks do with the third-overall pick? The organization suddenly has a legitimate collection of possibilities sitting in front of it. Caleb Malhotra continues climbing draft boards after an outstanding playoff run with the Ontario Hockey League’s Brantford Bulldogs. Reid is viewed by many as the best all-around defenceman available. As noted, Stenberg might still be there. And the Canucks seem comfortable with several of those outcomes.

According to Rick Dhaliwal, Vancouver reportedly had McKenna first on its internal draft board, Malhotra third, and Reid somewhere in the top five. That tells you something important: the Canucks are not simply drafting for positional need. They’re trying to identify elite talent first.

Vancouver already has some intriguing young pieces. Zeev Buium, Tom Willander, and Elias Pettersson on defence. Jonathan Lekkerimäki, Braeden Cootes, Marco Rossi, and Liam Öhgren up front. Those could turn out to be good young players. But are any of them true franchise-level difference-makers? Maybe not.

The Canucks need somebody who changes the organization’s ceiling. That player could still be there at third overall.

Item Three: Could Vancouver Trade Up for Stenberg?

What if the Canucks don’t want to risk missing out on Stenberg? If San Jose truly prefers a defenceman, the Sharks could become an ideal trade-down partner. They might still get the blueliner they want while adding extra assets. Meanwhile, Vancouver could guarantee itself the forward they covet most after McKenna.

Now, moving up from third to second overall wouldn’t be cheap. But the Canucks have some flexibility because of the extra draft capital they’ve collected. One idea floating around involves Vancouver offering third overall plus the Sharks’ own 2027 second-round pick back to San Jose in exchange for second overall.

That extra second-round pick could matter a lot to San Jose because this summer’s restricted free-agent market is loaded. Teams around the league are already watching names like Brandt Clarke, Simon Nemec, Jamie Drysdale, Pavel Mintyukov, and Braeden Schneider. If the Sharks want to weaponize offer sheets to quickly improve their blue line, getting their own pick back suddenly becomes valuable.

What’s Next for the Canucks?

The good news for Vancouver is that several paths out of this look promising. Whether the Canucks stay at three, trade up, or simply let the board fall naturally, they are positioned to add a premium young player to the organization.

And history says third overall is hardly a death sentence anyway. Henrik Sedin went third overall. So did Jonathan Toews, Leon Draisaitl, Scott Niedermayer, and Tim Stützle. Plenty of franchise-changing players have come from exactly this spot.

The bigger question now is whether the Canucks can build around whichever player arrives. This organization has spent years searching for stability, identity, and a long-term direction. Drafting near the top only matters if the development process afterward actually works. For the first time in a while, there’s a sense that the team might finally be standing on the edge of something meaningful.

The lottery didn’t hand them perfection. But it may have handed them a possibility.