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Vancouver Canucks select Braeden Cootes at No. 15 in 2025 NHL Draft

Adam Laskaris
Adam Laskaris
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Jun 28 2025, 1:14 am
Vancouver Canucks select Braeden Cootes at No. 15 in 2025 NHL Draft
Vancouver Canucks/YouTube

The Vancouver Canucks have a new top prospect in their fold.

On Friday night, the Canucks select centre Braeden Cootes from the Seattle Thunderbirds with the No. 15 pick in the NHL Draft.

A Sherwood Park, Alta. native, Cootes was the Thunderbirds’ captain this past season, scoring 26 goals and 37 assists in 60 games last season.

Cootes is described by The Athletic’s Corey Pronman as “a good, if not very good skater who plays with a lot of pace. He has strong offensive skills, playmaking and finishing abilities. He creates offense at fast tempos and in a direct manner.”

The draft was in a unique decentralized format this year, with the selections being taken over video conferencing rather than in one location.

While most of the top prospects were on site in Los Angeles at the Peacock Theatre, the NHL team staffs themselves, including the Canucks front office, were back at their home offices.

The new selection joins Tom Willander as one of two first-round picks in the organization waiting to make their NHL debut.

While we’ll wait to see what exactly the Canucks’ plan is for the youngster, they’ll likely head to Vancouver this week to check out the city, meet the team staff, and stick around for a few workouts and a mid-summer development camp in July before returning home for the summer.

What else is going on with the Canucks?

Outside of the draft, it was quite the day in Canucks world.

According to multiple reports, longtime Vancouver winger Brock Boeser will be heading to free agency this year, after he and the franchise were unable to come to terms on a deal.

Free agency opens up on July 1, with the Canucks having about US$7 million in cap space available after trading for Evander Kane earlier this week, as per PuckPedia.

Meanwhile, the Canucks also had reportedly held trade talks with the New York Islanders about a Mat Barzal trade, though it’s unclear how serious the conversations were.

The Canucks head into Saturday’s Day 2 of the NHL Draft with five other picks.

 

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