Elias Pettersson Signs $92.8 Million Contract With Vancouver ...

Elias Pettersson put an end to speculation surrounding his future by inking an eight-year contract ... [+] extension on Mar 2, 2024. (Photo by Jeff Vinnick/NHLI via Getty Images)

In a season that has been defined by success, the Vancouver Canucks’ most important win may have just come off the ice.

On Saturday morning, the club announced that it had inked star center Elias Pettersson to an eight-year contract extension worth a total of $92.8 million. It’s the richest contract in franchise history and will keep the 25-year-old in Vancouver through the 2031-32 season.

“This is a very important signing for the Vancouver Canucks,” said general manager Patrik Allvin in the team’s statement. “Elias is one of the top players in the National Hockey League and is a key member of our leadership group. We know his best days are ahead of him and with his high end skill and desire to be the best, we look forward to seeing Elias succeed and grow.”

Drafted fifth overall by the Canucks in 2017, Pettersson made an instant impact when he joined the team as a 19-year-old at the beginning of the 2018-19 season, scoring a seeing-eye goal against the Calgary Flames on the first shot of his NHL career.

He would go on to capture the 2019 Calder Trophy as rookie of the year, leading all rookies by a wide margin in goals (28) and points (66), and become the first Canuck to capture the trophy since Pavel Bure in 1992.

Now in his sixth season, Pettersson has grown into a better-than-a-point-a-game player, with 165 goals and 398 points in 387 career NHL games. In 2022-23, he cracked the century mark for the first time, finishing 10th overall in NHL scoring with 102 points. This season, he sits 10th again as of Saturday morning, with 75 points in 62 games.

After playing out his entry-level contract, Pettersson waited until the preseason was underway before inking a three-year bridge deal with a cap hit of $7.35 million on Oct. 3, 2021.

That contract was set to expire this summer, making him a restricted free agent. But with arbitration rights and only one year remaining before he could become an unrestricted free agent, the clock was already ticking toward midnight regarding a decision on Pettersson’s future.

Though he became eligible to sign an extension on July 1, 2023, Pettersson indicated that he wanted to wait to see the direction the team was headed in before putting pen to paper.

During a media conference on Saturday, he was forthright in his acknowledgement that, “I always wanted to stay here, but you don’t give up your cards in negotiation, right?”

And if he was looking for assurances that the Canucks were headed toward becoming a legitimate Stanley Cup contender, those have come in spades.

Since team president Jim Rutherford and general manager Patrick Allvin joined the team partway through the 2021-22 season, they have been aggressive in making changes — bringing in Rick Tocchet as the Canucks’ new coach in January of 2023, active in the trade and free-agency markets and even upgrading the team’s dressing room and player facilities — something Pettersson acknowledged was important to him when he spoke to the media on Saturday.

Everything clicked at the beginning of this season, starting with an opening-night 8-1 win over the Edmonton Oilers where Pettersson logged a goal and three assists. The team has spent most of the season at or near the top of the NHL standings and sent Tocchet and six players, including Pettersson, to February’s All-Star Weekend.

And even though the club hit a slump in February, going 5-6-2, the Canucks remain in first place in the Western Conference and hold a healthy 10-point lead over the second-place Vegas Golden Knights in the Pacific Division. It’s been a gargantuan step forward for a club whose only playoff appearance in the past eight years came in the fan-free Edmonton bubble during the summer of 2020.

The Canucks haven’t played a postseason game in front of their fans at Rogers Arena since a first-round loss to the Calgary Flames in 2015 — and no players from that roster are still with the team.

But the club has maintained the majority of the core group that punched above its weight in 2020, beating the Minnesota Wild in the best-of-five qualifying round before dethroning the defending Stanley Cup champion St. Louis Blues and pushing the Vegas Golden Knights to seven games. Up front, Pettersson and J.T. Miller tied for the team lead with 18 points in 17 playoff games, and Brock Boeser had 11 points. On the blue line, Quinn Hughes had a coming-out party with 16 points. And in net, Thatcher Demko staked his claim to a job as an NHL starter when he stepped in for an injured Jacob Markstrom against Vegas and gave up just two goals in four appearances, for an otherworldly .985 save percentage and 0.64 goals-against average.

The only core player to leave was former captain Bo Horvat, who was traded in January of 2023 as he approached unrestricted free agency himself. As part of the proceeds of that deal, the Canucks obtained a first-round draft pick that they used as part of the package sent to Detroit to acquire key defenseman Filip Hronek on Mar 1, 2023. Often paired with Hughes, 26-year-old Hronek has already hit a career high this season, with 44 points in 62 games.

Set to become a restricted free agent himself this summer, Hronek’s status is just one item on a long list that Allvin can address with more clarity now that he has cost certainty with Pettersson. Hughes and the injured Carson Soucy are the only top-four defensemen signed beyond this season. Up front, decisions will need to be made on trade-deadline acquisition Elias Lindholm, who was acquired during the All-Star break, as well as pending UFAs Teddy Blueger and Sam Lafferty.

Boeser will also be eligible to sign an extension on July 1. The 27-year-old leads the Canucks this year with 35 goals, a new career high.

As the scrutiny surrounding his contract status intensified over the last few weeks, Pettersson’s play fell off. After scoring 14 goals in 13 games in January, he tallied just twice in the same number of games in February, although he did log nine assists.

With a total value of $92.8 million, Pettersson’s new deal slots in as the ninth-highest of all-time, per Spotrac. Based on contracts currently on the books for 2024-25, Pettersson’s average annual value of $11.6 million is fifth-highest, just ahead of fellow Swede William Nylander, who inked an eight-year extension worth $92 million on Jan. 8.

But this is a deal that’s expected to age well. At 25, Pettersson is just entering his peak years, and should still be playing at a high level at age 33 when the contract expires. And with the NHL’s salary cap expected to start rising significantly over the next few years after a slowdown caused by the economics of the pandemic, contracts at or near nine figures should become more frequent occurrences going forward.

Now, the Canucks can get back to the business of winning hockey games. They’re on the road until the March 8 trade deadline, on a three-game road trip that kicks off Sunday against the Anaheim Ducks.