This Has Fans FIRED UP... - HUGE Canucks Prospect Update

This has fans fired up as a fan favorite seems to be hitting stride at just the right time and the top prospect is making waves for himself before he's a future Canucks All-Star. We're going to be breaking down all that in this episode of Canucks Digest. But first, we have a special offer for you guys and I'm going to let Mark take it from here. We're kicking off a March Madness bracket for the channel. We are a partner with the Hot Takes app and other Digest channels for this event. It's completely free to sign up. Just download the Hot Takes app, click the March Madness banner at the top and other groups like the Digest Media Pool. This is really exciting as there's over $25,000 in prizes to be won and there's such a smaller pool of people participating, there's a real chance at winning big. Check out the link below or scan the QR code to download that. Make sure to use the promo code DIGEST in all caps to get exclusive perks when signing in. Main event competition will start on March 16th and if you have any trouble, reach out to us in the email that will be down below in the description. once again i want to give a huge thank you to Hot Takes for partnering with us on this amazing competition thanks for that mark and without stopping the first topic today which is heating up at the right time so if you saw the intro video you know that we're going to be talking about Neil Hoaglander here where he started the season on the third line with training camp standout at UMass and Connor Garland, Hoaglander got off to a hot start with points in his first two games but then the struggles came back and he would find himself back in the fourth line role Even further than just the line demotion, his minutes declined. Höglander saw four straight games with less than 9 minutes and 15 seconds of ice time, bottoming out at 6 minutes and 28 seconds in a win over the Buffalo Sabres. He would then find himself with a seat in the press box with a few healthy scratches. The downfall went so far that there was serious belief he would be traded earlier this season. Now coming into this season, Höglander was given a three-year extension, getting $3 million a year, and he didn't entirely live up to that. It's been a tough little road here. for Höglander within this Canucks system where he's bounced around from AHL and NHL and just trying to find the right fit within Tocchet's system and to earn Tocchet's trust as well which we're going to touch on in a second but as well it's been an uphill battle for him this season as he tries to get back into Tocchet's good graces like we just said the points haven't been there and the little things to earn him ice time weren't either Höglander had a 22 game pointless streak in 30 games without a goal he now sits at just five goals and 11 assists for 16 points through 61 games this season but things started to turn around for Höglander once it flipped to 2025 during the month of january he scored two goals and six points through 13 games and at the time as well Höglander was on a podcast as well talking about how on canucks.com i should say actually where these last couple of weeks feel like he's getting more opportunities i feel like i'm playing better getting stronger on the puck and winning more pucks i'm trying to be more physical out there and i seem to have the puck more i feel like i want the puck more maybe before i was skating around out there and maybe and i was hopeful the puck would come to me but now i really want to have that puck that's what i think changed from the past i'm trying to gain their trust more and be better at the details talking knows what i can do in the open zone and the parts there but that just the small details are what what he wants from me and we know like i said that talking it's been up and down with him and Holglander where yeah there was videos of him making earlier this season where we thought for sure Holglander was going to get traded it seemed like the writing was on the wall because ice time seems to be the one thing that is very indicative of a player being traded on the Canucks we saw happen with Daniel Sprong where he was getting less ice time he was he was shipped out to Seattle then we had JT Miller as well it was just it was a very quick happening where his ice time just dipped and then he was shipped out to New York so we've seen this happen with many players as well as Carson Soucy as well we saw his ice time dip quite a bit before he was eventually traded back over to New York with JT Miller as well so it's something that we've seen very commonly with this Canucks team so it makes it's no surprise that we thought that the Holglander was going to be traded he was very intriguing trade bait i think for a lot of teams maybe we weren't going to get the return that we wanted for him but i think a team could have very much used him however I'm very happy that we did end up keeping him because he seems to be getting hot at just the right time when you look at his January stats like the article said he had a pretty solid January getting six points as well and then you look at March and February as well where he did register some points but he was getting involved more the time on ice definitely shot up a lot more and most of his stats that we're speaking on in the season were coming in the months of 2025 where that was most of his production was happening in just these first three months of the year as the Canucks are trying to fight for a playoff spot so Holglander he seems like he's getting hot at the right time he's getting in there he's getting pucks deep and he's creating opportunities not only for himself but also for teammates it's been really nice to see him kind of turn his game around and get more opportunities as well this isn't a player that i was necessarily wanting to get less ice time or wanting to see fail in any sense of the imagination i think this is just somebody who wasn't getting a lot of opportunities and just wasn't playing within the system that the way that talk it wanted him to but something definitely clicked where Holglander he's getting the puck more he's making shots happen he's getting in there he's being physical as well he's one of the fastest players we have out there on the ice and it seems like him and Elias Pettersson are starting to get things going a little bit after a very frustrating first three quarters of the season hey as long as you turn it on at some point it doesn't matter if you turn it on at the right time people will forget and I think that's what's going to happen with Holglander here where hopefully he's able to get a goal or an assist tonight against Chicago it's going to be very interesting to see down the stretch how he can carry this momentum forward keep it going and as well as some of his teammates as well Phil Horanek as of late even without Quinn Hughes without Quinn Hughes he seems to be playing very well versus with Quinn Hughes however we have Quinn Hughes back he's always going to be rolling Phil Horanek he's starting to get going, Neil Holglander is finally finding the score sheet and getting opportunities for himself, we have Pedersen is finally getting goals scored again so this Canucks team, I know it's very late in the season but we said this earlier in the season when we thought that the Canucks were going to be the opposite of last year, where last season we started out so hot in the first half and kind of fizzled out as we went into the playoffs this year as we were going into the season I was hoping that it would be the opposite, not that the consistent teams would just continue the way they have been, I did not predict that and did not want any of that, however I definitely pictured the Canucks starting off the season a little rocky and a little inconsistent and then finally catching steam as they headed into the playoffs, did I think that we were going to be in this exact position of fighting for a wild card spot for the playoffs, no I thought at worst we were going to be at third place in the Pacific, however this is the situation we're in, these are the cards we've been dealt, now the Canucks have to go out and execute and go win some hockey games and steal two points wherever they can as much as it sucks to go against a team that you're playing, that you're probably in play off contention with, like we're going to see coming up in a few games here wherever we can get two points in end of regulation games, take them as long as they're not against playoff teams where we can help them get more points if we're going into the Chicago game, hey if this goes to overtime as stressful as it'll be, that's two points that we can steal, I'm okay with that as much as it'll be a wild ride and against a team that we should be just absolutely smacking the hell out of this is a team where we can definitely steal a few points if it goes to uh extra periods whether it's an overtime or shootout like the thriller was against Calgary the other night it's going to be a wild ride but what do you guys think about Nils Höglander finally getting a little bit of steam going at the right time and just in time for the Canucks to get down this final push to the playoffs let us know what you guys think down in the comments below that's going to take us into our second topic of the day which is Tom Willander is an all-star so in the NCAA Hockey East Tom Willander was selected as the second team all-star and he is just one of seven defensemen in the NCAA and the only Hockey East blue liner to have at least 21 points in a plus 16 or better this season absolutely unreal for Tom Willander great season down there at Boston University can't wait for him to make that jump into Abbotsford for probably only a season or a season and a half before we finally see him on this Vancouver Canucks roster probably not as a mainstay right away I don't think it's going to be one of those situations however I think after maybe after I would say probably the season after next season I think we're going to see Willander get involved but hey I would love to see him get involved next season get some more opportunities maybe we'll see him pop in and maybe like five games next season but I think the season after next is where we're really going to see Tom Willander pop into this lineup in the same way that we saw Aatu at the beginning of the year the same way we saw pop in at the beginning of the year Linus Carlson who just got an extension he's popping up a few times so I can see Willander getting a lot of opportunities like that maybe not next season but definitely the season after before that after that season I think he's definitely going to be making that jump to this Canucks roster so within three years we are going to see Tom Willander hopefully playing with Quinn Hughes and Phil Horanek as part of the future core of this defense of this Canucks team where this is something that hey we have Phil Horanek Quinn Hughes and Tom Willander and we have something that we can carry on we'll still have Marcus Pedersen probably for a little bit there as well so those are really good top top four guys that I would feel very comfortable with that is given that Tom Willander is everything that we have that we are expecting him to be with what we've seen in Boston University he's been very impressive even on the world stage with what he's done with Sweden he's been very impressive there he's been nothing short of impressive really throughout his entire minor league and or his international and his collegiate career before he jumps over to the minors in the Abbotsford system it's going to be very interesting to see his career grow within this Canucks system and to see how he finally makes that jump to the NHL but what do you guys think about Tom Willander how high are you on him coming into this Canucks roster at some point and when do you guys think it's going to be that we see Tom Willander get more than five games appearing in the NHL in a season do you guys think it'll be as soon as next season or the season after let us know what you guys have to say down in the comments below we always love reading your guys's comments especially when the Canucks are winning hockey games that's when it's at the best because that's when we're all happy but that's going to do it for this episode of Canucks Digest big thanks to hot takes for being a supporter of this channel and of this video but with that i've been your host Griffin take care