By: Brayden Fengler / February 9, 2026 The Canucks and all of the NHL are on a three-week break thanks to NHL players finally returning to Olympic competition. With this pause to the NHL season, Canucks fans are also now in for a world of difference as they sit down to take in best on best Olympic hockey.
The Olympics should be a nice and welcome reprieve for invested Canucks fans, exhausted by cheering for their team to lose all in the name of future draft positioning. It makes sense for fans to not want the Canucks to win right now, but it’s simply no fun. With the Olympics, hockey can be fun again, if only for a little while.
With the NHL rat race frozen in time and the Canucks embarrassingly in 32nd place in the league with an 18-33-6 record, I can’t help but reflect on how I and other drained Canucks fans should be engaging with this team. What’s the right level of commitment that fans should be giving the Canucks when they come back this season and when they march on into this off-season and the next few years of rebuilding?
Nothing about the immediate timeline of this team is fun. Like when you look at your calendar in mid-January and realize that the next significant holiday break is nowhere in sight. It’s still cold outside and dark when you leave work, and you just want to put your head down until you can crack a cold one in a lawn chair.
So what’s the hockey equivalent of that? If you’re a dedicated Canucks fan, but you’re feeling that urge to keep your head down through the worst of it. What’s the play?
Now, I’m not advocating for the complete abandonment of this team, and just waiting around for the next time you hear the bandwagon rolling down the road. I don’t think anyone reading a Canucks blog at this moment has it in them to remove themselves from this circus to that degree. But what I am advocating is for exhausted fans to consider, at least for a time, genuinely dialling back the energy that they invest in this team.
That suggestion of “dialling back” as a fan may sound lazy, or treasonous to the sport of hockey, but I think it’s a reasonable option for many people, given where we’re at. Will I do it… I’m writing a hockey blog about the worst team in the league, clearly I have a sickness that can’t be cured. But maybe for a short amount of time or for more casual fans that came on during the 2023-24 run, this could be what the doctor ordered.
The first thing I’d recommend, if you want to dabble in a more relaxed approach to viewing this team, is not to stress about seeing every game or every minute of every game on TV. Everyone is different when it comes to their viewing habits, but I know personally that when this team is good or even just competing, it’s appointment viewing for me.
I’m not saying avoid the games, but don’t adjust your life around them like you might want to do when they’re a team worth watching.
Are you finishing a show that’s gonna run into the start time of the first period? Finish the episode. You’re making plans that might conflict with a game day? Who cares?
Just as this team is coasting through its season, it’s okay to coast in and out yourself. Relaxing your grip doesn’t make you a bad fan; it makes you a sane person.
So if you plan to check out of this team even a little bit, when should you be checking back in? Well, I think this is a good timeline for this coming year and potentially even the next one if the rebuild looks to be taking a while.
End of the season
Honestly, there is nothing more to be gained from watching this season. Quinn Hughes is gone, Keifer Sherwood is gone, and Thatcher Demko is done for the season once again because of an injury. It’s really just the Conor Garland and Elias Pettersson (forward) show now, and there is really only so much that those two can do with the rest of the team as it is.
Watch the games if you must, or check the box scores. But right now is the worst time to be watching Canucks hockey, as the reality of performance during a rebuild is on full display, but the benefits of it are close to kicking in.
Draft lottery
The exact date for the NHL draft lottery has not been announced, but historically it has taken place in early May, just shy of two months before the entry draft. This is the time of year when the vibes can and will be shifted for teams contending for those lottery picks.
With Vancouver living in the basement of the standings, their odds are strong and will likely remain strong when they finish the season. We all know how it can go though. The Canucks could have the best odds to draft first overall, and the luck of the draw could have them drafting third. But this is the time to check back in.
Entry draft
Whether the results of the lottery were good or bad, this is the time teams get to convert that luck or lack thereof into real, tangible talent for their NHL teams. Whether it’s Gavin KcKenna, Keaton Verhoeff or Ivar Stenberg, there is a lot to like about the top of this draft class. No matter where the Canucks fall, they are very likely to be in a spot to pick an extremely impactful player. Even if the player they pick needs another year to develop after the draft, it will be okay at that time for fans to be excited, even just for a moment.
Free agency
This one is more optional. Free agency is a scary time in a lot of respects. Teams with intentions to do the right thing and rebuild the right way may get distracted by a shiny new toy on the market. They may spend a lot on a hot ticket player that may come with some immediate excitement, but doesn’t fit the timeline of the team’s return to contention.
I’d recommend checking in around July 1st with one eye open. Just to make sure, and hopefully feel relief when the Canucks don’t make any hasty pick-ups.
U.S. Thanksgiving
Maybe keep an eye out for the team’s Young Stars event, but beyond that, if you really want to stretch out the peace that you will get over the summer months, you can skip training camp. Don’t worry too much about pre-season and even only casually check in when the 2026-27 campaign kicks off. The next time that it really matters, if you really want to take this team’s pulse, see where they are at by US Thanksgiving and plan accordingly.
If they are playing well, it may be worth diving back into the craziness a bit more; even if it’s just a PDO bender, it’s fun to ride those waves as a fan.
But if the team is still in the dumps, and it looks like the rebuild is on track, decide what to do from there. Does it make sense to keep your viewing casual, or is it too hard to stay away from the madness?
At the end of the day, with sports, like with most things in life, you get out of it what you put into it. When this team one day wins it all, the fans that stick by them through the hard times will no doubt be the ones who find the most sweetness in the nectar that is a Stanley Cup championship.
But there is a difference between sticking by a team through the hard times and letting that team drag you over every bump in the road. If you’re reading this, you’re a Canucks fan no matter what and the details of how that looks are completely up to you.