By: Brayden Fengler / December 19, 2025 Last Christmas, my brother-in-law gifted a Canucks Jersey to his girlfriend; it was, of course, a Quinn Hughes jersey. As the box was opened, I watched as someone who I had never seen excited about hockey become visibly excited to receive a hockey jersey.
For many reasons, Quinn so easily opened the door for those kinds of moments, moments that transcended the normal reach of the Canucks. Of the many things I will miss about Quinn Hughes being a Canuck, it’s moments like that, as someone who follows this team and relishes opportunities to share and discuss it with people who don’t, that I will miss the most.
The day that Quinn Hughes was traded, I had an article ready to go, about that weird limbo period we were all stuck in for weeks on end.
Quinn Hughes was still on the Canucks and was still the captain of the Canucks, but for a while before he left, the inevitability of what was to come felt suffocating. While waiting for the other shoe to drop, the days were long and the games were even harder to watch than they otherwise would’ve been.
It’s not surprising that this outcome finally came to pass last week. Hughes is a generational player. The best player to ever play for the Vancouver Canucks. He is also in the second-to-last year of his contract. July 1st of next year would have been the earliest that he could’ve opted to extend with Vancouver if he wanted to. But why he left when he did comes down to what is universal about Hockey players.
What do hockey players want to do? Win. What do generational players have the power to do? Play for a winning team. Are the Canucks a winning team? No.
While there is a temptation to look further into Quinn’s decision, for an answer that will cool this raw wound we’re all feeling, I fear that it really doesn’t get more complicated than that.
I don’t doubt for a second that in the past, whenever Quinn spoke highly of this City and this team, that he meant what he said. He said as much in his first presser in Minnesota that Canucks owners and management had been “first class” while navigating through everything leading up to his trade.
But beyond the pull of the east, where Quinn and his family call home, winning, and the Canucks lack of it, seems to be the reason why he is gone.
I’m sure Quinn liked his view of the North Shore mountains or False Creek. But as nice as they were, a nice place to live and play should not be expected to satisfy the fire that players like Quinn Hughes have. Winning hockey games and ultimately winning hockey’s grand prize is all that matters.
Quinn deserved better, and it’s heartbreaking to know that this team couldn’t give it to him. After all this time, here we are again, on the outside looking in. We’re on the eve of 2026, with the hype of April 2023 as fuzzy a memory as 2011.
Amongst the spotlight that was burning on Hughes as this news came to light, it was at least a nice consolation prize to read quotes from other Canucks like Thatcher Demko and Conor Garland about how much they have always, and still want to remain a Canuck.
In speaking with Thomas Drance of the Athletic, Conor Garland remarked about how he told Hughes that he hoped he would be on the team for the next 20 years, but said, “I’m extending no matter what”. When asked by Drance about the uncertainty around the Hughes situation in relation to Demko’s decision to re-sign, Demko similarly remarked, “I knew I wanted to be a Canuck. There’s no ifs or buts about that.”
It’s certainly nice to hear that in the midst of what may be one of the worst seasons in Canucks history, there are still impactful members of this club that want to stay a part of it. But no matter how many players come out and say they want to stay, it doesn’t change the fact that a player like Quinn Hughes has left.
There is certainly validity in evaluating the return that this team got for Hughes, and even holding a positive opinion as I do about the potential for Marco Rossi, Zeev Buium, Liam Ohgren and Minnesota’s 2026 first round pick. But when talking about a player like Hughes, the objective upside of his trade on paper does not overshadow the feelings of loss for the era we now leave behind. An era when we could call Quinn Hughes a Canuck.
As much as I will miss the “hockey things” about Quinn Hughes, his undefinable offensive skills, his ankle-breaking skating ability, what I will miss most of all about Hughes the Canuck, is the peripheral vibes that he unwittingly brought upon this fan base.
I wrote a whole article on this very concept back in February, where I asked a variety of Canucks fans and Quinn Hughes supporters for their thoughts on why Quinn Hughes the player, person and captain was worth cheering for so intensely. That article now serves as a time capsule to the unbridled love that this city had for Quinn Hughes.
Thinking about that question now. What was it about Quinn Hughes that made his presence so large in this City? Is he an amazing player? Yes. Could he be considered cute? Sure, his nickname was Huggy Bear. Do his hundred-yard stares create a perfectly blank canvas for fans to project hilarious notions onto? Yes, without fail. It’s really all of that, and a lot more, that makes Hughes, Hughes.
His style of play and personality can not be replicated or picked off the shelf. It’s the intangible and indescribable elements that made this City fall in love with him, and that makes it so much harder to let ourselves let him go.
Emotionally, when Miller was traded last year, or even when the Canucks lost their last Captain in Bo Horvat, I would say that I maintained composure around those situations, not unlike a Quinn Hughes benchside stare. But with Hughes’ departure, I’m having a hard time doing the same, and just wish he were here to give us some pointers.