The Vancouver Canucks added a towering presence to their blue line on Wednesday, signing Jamie Oleksiak to a two-year contract.
At 33, Oleksiak brings size in a hurry. He’s listed at 6-foot-7 and 251 pounds, which makes him an easy player to spot on the ice and an obvious candidate to bring some muscle and stability to Vancouver’s back end.
He also arrives with a family name that already carries a different kind of weight in Canada.
Oleksiak is the older brother of Penny Oleksiak, the Canadian swimmer whose Olympic résumé has made her one of the country’s biggest sports figures. Penny has seven Olympic medals, tying Canada’s all-time record. She broke out at the Rio 2016 Summer Olympics by winning four swimming medals at age 16, then added three more at Tokyo 2020.
Jamie is eight years older than Penny, and the family’s size seems to run together. Penny is listed at 6-foot-1.
“She’s still my little sister, right? Even now, whenever I see her, I don’t really see her as the big Olympian swimmer.
I think we do a good job of putting our jobs aside and just being siblings,” Jamie said of his sister before the Tokyo 2020 Olympics. “Me, Penny, and my other sister, we’re pretty close.
Whenever we get together, we don’t really talk too much about it. But watching her [compete], it’s surreal.”
Now Jamie Oleksiak steps into a Canucks room where he may end up filling a different kind of family role - the big brother type for younger teammates. He should give Vancouver a veteran hand for young blueliners such as Zeev Buium, Tom Willander, and Elias Pettersson.
On the left side of the defense, he’s the only veteran option, which makes it reasonable to expect he’ll skate alongside right-shot defenseman Tom Willander next season.
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