The Canucks don’t just have work to do in the standings. They’ve got work to do on the scale, too.
According to The Athletic’s latest look at NHL physical profiles, Vancouver enters the 2026-27 season tied for sixth-shortest in the league, with an average height of 73.3 inches - just over 6-foot-1. That puts the Canucks a shade below the NHL average of 73.6 inches. The only teams shorter are the Colorado Avalanche, Seattle Kraken, Nashville Predators, Minnesota Wild, and Pittsburgh Penguins.
The bigger issue, though, is the weight column. Vancouver checks in at 194.4 pounds on average, making it the lightest team in the NHL. The Calgary Flames are right behind at 194.5, but the Canucks still sit almost seven pounds under the league average of 201.3.
Part of that comes with the territory of a rebuild, especially one still in its early stages. The Canucks are the ninth-youngest team in the league, with an average age of 27.1.
Only the St. Louis Blues, Chicago Blackhawks, San Jose Sharks, Montreal Canadiens, Calgary Flames, New York Rangers, Buffalo Sabres, and Anaheim Ducks are younger.
Even so, Vancouver is lighter than all of them except Calgary.
That’s where the real concern starts to show. Youth explains some of the size gap, but not all of it.
As players develop, they’ll naturally add some muscle and fill out a bit. That should happen with younger Canucks such as Zeev Buium, Tom Willander, Jonathan Lekkerimäki, and Liam Öhgren.
But that kind of growth only moves the needle so far.
If the Canucks want a meaningful change, the roster itself has to change.
There’s a chance that comes through turnover. Some of the players Vancouver may move on from in the next couple of years are also among its slighter regulars, including Brendan Gallagher (5’9”, 183 pounds), Jake DeBrusk (6’1”, 198 pounds), Marco Rossi (5’10”, 196 pounds), and possibly Filip Hronek (6’0”, 187 pounds) and the senior-most Elias Pettersson (6’2”, 185 pounds).
That’s only half the equation, though. Letting smaller players go helps only if they’re replaced by bigger ones, and that’s not a simple fix when some of the club’s heftiest pieces are also likely on the move.
Jamie Oleksiak (6’7”, 251 pounds), Luke Schenn (6’2”, 225 pounds), Drew O’Connor (6’4”, 209 pounds), and Paul Cotter (6’2”, 212 pounds) are all likely to depart sooner rather than later. Finding comparably large bodies to backfill those spots is easier said than done.
The encouraging sign is that GM Ryan Johnson appears to already be leaning into the problem the only way that really matters over time: through the draft. Vancouver’s first three picks in the 2026 NHL Entry Draft were Caleb Malhotra (6’2”, 185), Adam Novotny (6’1”, 205), and Brooks Rogowski (6’7”, 236).
They’re still teenagers, but each projects to be bigger than the Canucks are right now on average. If those players develop into roster regulars and eventually take on bigger roles, Vancouver should start climbing those size charts.
Johnson’s first draft is only the beginning. The longer-term answer is a consistent draft approach that keeps size in view.
The league is trending bigger, and if the Canucks want to catch up, they need to treat size as part of the evaluation process. Smaller players can still have a place, but the overall average has to move up.
That lines up with the way Johnson has already talked about building the roster. Before signing Oleksiak, Schenn, and Cotter, he said, “People that know me know I like size, I like speed, I like character. I like stiffness by committee and not through one person or one line.”
That vision may be the roadmap Vancouver follows as it tries to climb out of both basements at once: the height and weight basements, and the standings basement. The Canucks don’t just need to get better. They need to get better and bigger together.
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