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Evander Kane is the newest member of the Vancouver Canucks — and the veteran forward broke the trade himself. The now former Edmonton Oiler posted a lengthy message on social media announcing the move on Wednesday.
“As my time with the [Oilers] has now come to a close, I want to take a moment to sincerely thank the entire organization, my teammates, and the incredible community of Edmonton,” Kane wrote on X, formerly Twitter.
The controversial forward continued: “With that said, I’m incredibly excited for the next chapter of my career as I join the Canucks. It’s an honor to become part of an organization and team I grew up watching as a kid. Vancouver is a city that lives and breathes hockey, I’m looking forward to the opportunity to play in front of my hometown as I did many years ago as a Vancouver Giant.”
Kane grew up in Vancouver and will now join his hometown team, which was his preference, according to The Athletic's Pierre LeBrun.
The Canucks will take on all of Kane's $5.125 million cap hit, and are sending a 2025 fourth-round pick to the Oilers in exchange. The 33-year-old has one season remaining on that contract, and will become an unrestricted free agent next summer.
Canucks running out of cap space
Although Kane will certainly help the Canucks next season — and give them the hard-nosed top-six forward they were looking for — Vancouver doesn't have a ton of cap space left.
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Currently, they project with just over $7 million, with three pending unrestricted free agents in Brock Boeser, Pius Suter and Noah Juulsen. It's looking likely that all three of those players will be going to market on July 1, especially now with Kane's $5 million on the books.
For the Oilers, they recoup some much-needed cap space. Kane was seen as a top trade candidate after his antics at the end of the Stanley Cup Final against the Florida Panthers. He was given a 10-minute misconduct late in Game 6 and refused to come out and shake hands with the Panthers after the final game of the 2024-25 NHL season.
Now with $17 million in cap space after the trade, Edmonton has some extra money to try and bring a couple of players back. Corey Perry, Jeff Skinner, Connor Brown, Kasperi Kapanen and Trent Frederic are all UFAs, while star defenseman Evan Bouchard is a RFA and will be due for a massive raise this summer.
Of course, Connor McDavid is also going to need a new deal, which can be signed as soon as July 1. Trading Kane made a lot of sense for the Oilers, and it was important that they got a team to take on the entire contract.
That's exactly what the Canucks did, and it only cost them a fourth-round pick to add an effective NHL forward. It'll be interesting to see if the front office will be able to re-sign the veteran in his hometown.
