Quinn Hughes To Minnesota: First Thoughts

I guess it was inevitable. On Friday night the Canucks traded Quinn Hughes to the Minnesota Wild in exchange for Zeev Buium, Marco Rossi, Liam Öhgren, and a 2026 1st round pick. Though we knew a Quinn Hughes trade was a very real possibility, I was still left absolutely blindsided by that Elliotte Friedman tweet.

Quinn Hughes is the best player we’ve ever seen wear a Canucks jersey. His 432 points in 459 games is the most in franchise history by a defenseman, a record Hughes broke at the age of just 26. He won the Norris Trophy in 2023-24 when he put up 92 points and boasted a +38 rating, which helped the Canucks claim the Pacific Division title that year. Somehow, some way, he almost forced last year’s Canucks into the playoffs. That would have been 2018 Taylor Hall-esque.

But here we are. On December 12th, 2025, Quinn Hughes became a Minnesota Wild.

It’s a devastating trade for the Canucks. You are losing your franchise player and you will never get a guy like him again. It may take a long time before someone as skilled as him ever finds his way onto the Canucks again. But what’s done is done, and there’s no use in moping around over it. Instead, what I want to do is look at the return. It’s quite spicy.

Let’s kick it off with Liam Öhgren. The 21-year-old Swede has had his struggles in the NHL this season, with 0 points in 18 games and uninspiring analytics. He was the 19th overall pick in 2022, and while the potential is there, he hasn’t been able to find his footing in a sub-10 minutes-per-game role with Minnesota. It’s not to say that he needed a change of scenery, as his career was still young, but it certainly can’t do him much harm. He still projects to be an effective NHL player, and will likely end up being a middle-6 winger if he progresses the way he should. He’s a pretty decent piece, which is fantastic, because he’s the 4th best part of the return.

Let’s keep going in order, then. The 3rd best piece the Canucks received in this trade was the 1st round pick in 2026. Getting a draft pick in a Quinn Hughes trade was an absolute no-brainer, and they got it done. Unfortunately, Minnesota is going to make the playoffs, meaning that the 1st rounder will likely end up being a late one. The 2026 draft is not exactly a deep one, so the pick may not be exactly the quality that you instantly imagine when you think of a 1st rounder. Still, though, the Canucks are likely to get an NHL-calibre player out of that pick. I’d rank this over Öhgren for the simple reason that the Canucks are free to choose exactly who they feel fulfills a need for the team. It’ll be their 2nd pick of the 1st round (unless they do the stupidest thing possible by trading one of the picks), so really there’s no pressure. This was a piece that was going to come in any trade, so it’s not exactly shocking. Welcome, though.

Moving onto the 2nd best piece from the trade: Marco Rossi. It’s funny, throughout the summer I was begging the Canucks to trade for Rossi. We were in desperate need of a 2nd line centre, and while Rossi was going through contract disputes with the Wild, it seemed like a perfect time to swoop in and make a move for him. If you told me back then that Marco Rossi would be a Vancouver Canuck in December, I would jump for joy. If you told me it would come via a Quinn Hughes trade, I’d probably die on the spot. 

Still, I am a huge fan of Marco Rossi. He’s just 5’9 and is one of the smaller players in the NHL, but I really don’t care about that as much as a lot of people do. Especially when it’s a player who just put up 60 points in his age 23 season. Now 24, Rossi fills a spot that the Canucks desperately needed to fill. Also, 24 was the absolute maximum I was interested in going for any main piece in a Quinn Hughes return. Rossi’s the oldest one of the 3 players, so the Canucks really nailed it there.

Rossi is a very good player. Though there is cause for concern injury-wise due to his recent stint on the injured list, I’ll shut down the concerns by saying that he played 82 games each of the past two seasons before this one. He’s also nearing a return from the injured list, so he should be ready to slot into the Canucks lineup soon. 

Which is great, because I can’t stomach David Kampf as my 1C anymore.

Rossi has 13 points in 17 games this season. At just 24, he can be a staple in the Canucks 2C slot for years to come. A young centre was one of the main targets for the Canucks in a Quinn Hughes trade, and they succeeded. I’m a big fan of this pickup.

But the pickup I’m the most excited for is Zeev Buium. Buium is a 20-year-old offensive defenseman who is right in the middle of his rookie season. Though the defensive analytics haven’t quite been on his side so far, his offense has been there. Buium has 14 points in 31 games so far, which is tremendously respectable scoring for a rookie defenseman. Especially one who’s been playing on a pairing with Zach Bogosian as of late.

Zeev Buium is our new Quinn Hughes. Now, though he’s likely never going to quite hit the level Quinn Hughes is at, Buium has the potential to be a top defenseman in the league. I’m not too worried about the defensive analytics for now. I mean, remember Hughes’ sophomore season?

Buium is such a highly touted player and it’s really exciting to add him to the team. The element he does have going for him over Hughes is his age. He’s 6 years younger, meaning we have a lot of Zeev Buium hockey in front of us. I cannot wait to watch him develop, and I think the pieces around him (Hronek, M. Pettersson, Myers) are great leaders to help him grow as a player.

When I was considering possible Quinn Hughes trades, I felt it was an absolute necessity to get a young defenseman back. My mind went to either Šimon Nemec in New Jersey or Alexander Nikishin in Carolina, but I like Buium even more than I like either of those guys. He’s also younger than both of them, which again is a big plus. This is a huge pickup for the Canucks.

So, overall, am I satisfied with the return? Honestly, yes. Nothing was ever going to be a proper return in a Quinn Hughes trade, so getting a 1st rounder and 3 young players who project to be our top defenseman, 2C, and solid top-9 forward is fine by me.

The interesting bit of information that came out just following the trade was the fact that Jim Rutherford was given indication over a year ago that Quinn Hughes was likely never going to re-sign in Vancouver. So here’s what I’m thinking: if you have the choice to finish dead last with Quinn Hughes so he can leave you, or finish dead last with a crop of young talent that make up your new future, what would you choose? I’m taking Buium, Rossi, Öhgren and a 1st over absolutely nothing every single day. I would simply have to hope you would too.

I will obviously miss Quinn Hughes as a Canuck. The things he did on the ice were absolutely mystifying and it was honestly a privilege to get to watch that for my favourite team. I respect him for making his intentions clear to Rutherford so that we don’t get Tavares’d. I will always root for him as long as he’s not playing the Canucks.

That being said, I’m excited to start a fresh, new chapter in Vancouver. Jim Rutherford has finally said the word “rebuild.” The Quinn Hughes trade is the start. There are so many other pieces on this team that the front office needs to sell so we can fully commit to building for the future. The Quinn Hughes trade opened a can of worms. If he had to get traded, then so does everyone else.

Evander Kane next, please?