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Vancouver Canucks fans loved what Pronger said and want him to take over the team

Rob Williams
Rob Williams
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Mar 9 2026, 7:54 pm
Vancouver Canucks fans loved what Pronger said and want him to take over the team
Jeff Curry/USA TODAY Sports

Chris Pronger has landed in Vancouver, and local hockey fans are already ready to hand him a role in Canucks management.

The Hall of Fame defenceman isn’t in town for a new job — he’s working Amazon Prime Video’s broadcast at Rogers Arena. But he asked for questions, and boy did he get some from Canucks fans.

The answer that had a number of Canucks fans buzzing came in response to a question from someone wondering what Pronger’s offseason priorities would be if he were general manager.

Pronger’s answer was more inspiring than anything we’ve heard from the current regime of late.

“Rebuild a winning culture,” Pronger said. “Canucks have not had that type of identity since early 2010s. Swagger and belief are important before the wins start to pile up. Development is going to be the most important part of their rebuild. [Unrestricted free agents] will be last pieces.”

“Rebuilds start with identifying specific players already in the organization to build with, if any. Drafting well is essential to not stalling the process and creating a culture to develop from within and then adding [free agents] when closer to window to win a championship.”

That was pretty much all Canucks fans had to hear.

“Come save us,” said one Canucks fan.

“Hire him,” replied another.

The culture topic is an interesting one. Patrik Allvin stumbled on a question about the Canucks’ “culture problem” back in December.

Three years ago, Kevin Bieksa delivered an inspiring speech in the Canucks dressing room, with “culture” being at the forefront.

“The cultureā€™s got to change,” Bieksa said in a later interview. “My culture speech ā€” that worked for my group and the people and the personalities in my dressing room. Thatā€™s not necessarily going to be exactly the way this teamā€™s culture is going to be moving forward… They have to kind of develop their own, because their leaders are different.”

It’ll be interesting to see what changes come in Canucks management this summer, if any.

Will Jim Rutherford and Patrik Allvin be trusted to clean up the mess that was created under their watch? The Canucks have been to the playoffs just once in four years and are now in a full-scale rebuild.

Rutherford’s reputation precedes him, but he also just celebrated his 77th birthday. Allvin, meanwhile, is a first-time GM. How much rope will he get?

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