There’s nothing more Canadian than the game of hockey, so it’s not surprising that more than 40 percent of current NHLers are from the Great White North. You don’t have to look far to find terrific talent from the jagged Rockies, or the sprawling prairies, or the East Coast’s craggy cliffs.
From sea to shining sea, here’s a look at the best and most dominant active NHL player from each Canadian province.
British Columbia — Jamie Benn
We’ll start things off in the West on Vancouver Island, the birthplace of Dallas Stars captain Jamie Benn.
Benn was an outright steal for the Stars, selected in the fifth round of the 2007 NHL Entry Draft. He’s spent his entire 15-year NHL career in the Lone Star State and has racked up 383 goals and 524 assists for 907 points in 1,112 career games. His best two seasons were 2014-15 — where he recorded 35 goals and 52 assists for 87 points and captured the Art Ross Trophy — and 2015-16, where he put up 41 goals and 48 assists for 89 points.
A complete player who possesses a hard shot and plays a heavy game, Benn has been a Stars’ cornerstone for a long time but somehow manages to keep a fairly low profile despite being an NHL All-Star. He’s not flashy, but he’s a workhorse who’s very durable.
Related: NHL’s Top 5 Left Wingers of the Decade
Benn has also had international success: he won a gold medal at the 2009 World Junior Championships in Ottawa and an Olympic gold in 2014 in Sochi. He looks destined to be a Star for life: he’s 34 years old now and his contract is up after next season, but it would be surprising to see him sign anywhere else.
Honourable Mentions (in alphabetical order): Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Sam Reinhart, Morgan Rielly
Alberta — Taylor Hall
Hailing from the foothills of Calgary, Taylor Hall was the first of three Edmonton Oilers’ first-overall picks.
Chosen in the 2010 NHL Entry Draft after a standout juniors career with the Windsor Spitfires in which he helped the club capture back-to-back Memorial Cups and was the Cup MVP both times, the left-winger really came into his own in 2013-14, when he posted 80 points. He hasn’t really looked back since then.
Although the Oilers were abysmal for most of his tenure there, Hall still has 266 goals and 431 assists for 697 points in his 14-year career. His best offensive season came in 2017-18, his second campaign with the New Jersey Devils. That season, where he popped in 39 goals and added 54 apples for 93 points, won him the Hart Memorial Trophy.
Hall struggled with some injuries in 2019-20 season, but is undoubtedly an explosive player with great puck skills and a natural knack for finding the back of the net. He was traded to the Arizona Coyotes, where he recorded 10 goals and 17 assists in 30 games before the NHL shut down due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
In 2019-20, he began the season with the Buffalo Sabres on a one-year contract but finished up with the Boston Bruins, being traded there near the Trade Deadline. He recorded 10 goals and 23 assists between the two teams. He spent two more seasons with the Bruins before being traded to the Chicago Blackhawks in June, 2023, but was limited to 10 games in 2023-24 due to a knee injury that required surgery.
Honourable Mentions: Cale Makar, William Nylander, Brayden Point
Saskatchewan — Jordan Eberle
Hailing from Regina, Saskatchewan’s capital, Jordan Eberle has capitalized on plenty of scoring opportunities through his 14-season career. He is the current active points leader from the prairie province, with 299 goals and 403 assists for 702 points. The current Seattle Kraken winger and two-time NHL All-Star reached a significant milestone in 2023-24, playing in his 1000th-career NHL game.
Eberle, also known as “Mr. Clutch,” was drafted 22nd overall by the Oilers in the 2008 NHL Entry Draft after two strong seasons with his hometown Regina Pats. He spent the first seven seasons of his career in Edmonton, recording four 50-plus point seasons but only reaching the playoffs once as the Oilers were in the early stages of a prolonged, stop/start rebuild.
In 2017, just after the Oilers made the playoffs for the first time in Eberle’s tenure, they traded him to the New York Islanders. He spent four seasons there and reached the Stanley Cup Final in 2019-20; he was a key contributor to that unexpectedly-deep Isles playoff run, scoring five goals and adding nine assists for 14 points in 22 games.
The Islanders left Eberle unprotected in the 2022 NHL Expansion Draft after a 33-point season and the Kraken selected him in hopes of injecting a veteran presence. He has 151 points in his three seasons in Seattle and also serves as an an alternate captain. Now 34 years old, it appears the Kraken may be Eberle’s third and final team of his career: he is locked up there through 2025-26 and is an important part of the young franchise’s leadership core, top six, and power play.
Eberle does not have a Stanley Cup yet, but has a pair of gold medals from the international stage to hang around his neck: he helped Canada to gold at the 2009 World Juniors and to gold at the 2015 World Championships; in the latter tournament, he had five goals and eight assists for finish second in tournament scoring.
Honorable Mentions: Brayden Schenn, Jaden Schwartz, Chandler Stephenson
Manitoba — Mark Stone
Mark Stone has had some injury problems in recent seasons — and his penchant for going on the Long Term Injured Reserve but always coming back just in time for playoffs has garnered plenty of criticism from those who believe the Vegas Golden Knights are engaging in salary cap gymnastics — but when the Winnipegger is in the lineup, he makes an impact.
The right winger, who grew up playing U18 hockey in Winnipeg and had a standout junior career with the Brandon Wheat Kings, has racked up 567 points (213 goals, 355 assists) in 640 games over 12 NHL Seasons.
The now 32-year-old has never been a great skater, but is outstanding with his stick and has the ability to score goals from both in tight and from a distance. He has eight 20-plus goal seasons, seven 60-plus point campaigns, and one 70-plus point campaign on his resume.
Stone was a draft steal by the Ottawa Senators, as he did not hear his name called until the sixth round in 2010 (he had recorded just 28 points with the Wheat Kings in the season preceding the draft, but exploded for 106 the season after he was drafted.) He spent the first six-and-a-half seasons of his career in Canada’s capital before being traded to the Golden Knights in 2019; he was one of the biggest pieces of trade bait on the board at that deadline, and the Golden Knights locked him up to an eight-year deal worth $76 million that offseason.
The move has paid great dividends, even though Stone has not played more than 65 games in a season over the past five seasons due to various injuries and ailments. He was named first captain in franchise history in 2021 and in his tenure in Sin City, has 256 points in 274 games and 64 points in 75 playoff games. He was electric in their 2023 postseason run that resulted in a five-game Stanley Cup Final victory over the Florida Panthers, racking up 11 goals and 13 assists for 24 points in 22 games.
Stone has two seasons left on his deal, and as long as he can stay healthy, should continue to be a big contributor to the Knights’ offensive attack.
Honourable mentions: Max Domi, Seth Jarvis, Damon Severson
Ontario — Connor McDavid
This is an obvious choice, but the right one. While there are dozens of superb players from Ontario — especially from the “hockey player factory” towns in the province’s southern portion — no one is more dominant in today’s NHL than Richmond Hill’s Connor McDavid.
A once-in-a-generational talent, “The Chosen One” has recorded 982 points in just 645 NHL games since being chosen first overall in 2015. A human highlight reel, the centre has outrageous wheels, blows by opponents with ease, and owns out-of-sight offensive awareness.
In 2020-21, he recorded an eye-popping 105 points in just 56 games against Canadian Division opponents, who were powerless to stop him. In 2022-23, he recorded 153 points, the most in a single-season of anyone not named Wayne Gretzky, Mario Lemieux, or Steve Yzerman. In 2023-24, he became just the fourth player in NHL history to record 100 assists in a season.
He’s only 27 but has already seven 100-plus point seasons and has won five Art Ross Trophies, a four Ted Lindsay Awards, and three Hart Memorial Trophies.
Related: Edmonton Oilers With 100-Point Seasons
It’s hard to see McDavid being anything other than a perennial All-Star and 100-plus-point player for another decade, at least. He’s truly the cream of the NHL crop and his prime is just beginning.
Honourable Mentions: Brent Burns, Claude Giroux, Mark Scheifele, Steven Stamkos, John Tavares
Quebec — Jonathan Huberdeau
Jonathan Huberdeau struggled in his first two seasons with the Calgary Flames, but for a number of seasons, the Saint-Jerome, PQ product was downright dominant.
An elite playmaker with great hands who excels on the rush, Huberdeau has 831 points (225 goals, 495 assists) in 720 games over 12 seasons. His best campaign came directly before his downturn, when he piled up 115 points (30 goals and a league-leading 85 assists) in 2021-22 as the Panthers captured the Presidents’ Trophy.
Related: 7 Cool Things About Jonathan Huberdeau
Huberdeau spent the first 10 seasons of his career with the Panthers, who drafted him third overall in 2011 just after he helped the Saint John Sea Dogs capture a Memorial Cup. He put the NHL on notice in his rookie 2012-13, capturing the Calder Trophy by recording 31 points in 48 games in the lockout-shortened campaign.
Huberdeau, in 671 games for the Panthers, recorded 613 points and was named an NHL All-Star three times. However, the Panthers had little postseason success in his time there, making the playoffs just four times and making it past the first round just once.
The Panthers traded Huberdeau to the Flames in July, 2022 as part of a package in return for Matthew Tkachuk, who wasn’t interested in re-signing with the Flames. Consensus at the time of the deal was that it was highway robbery by the Flames, but two years later, the swap is seen much differently.
Huberdeau signed a massive eight-year, $84 million deal with the Flames just after the trade, but his numbers over his first two seasons in Calgary did not live up to expectations or his salary: he recorded just 55 points in 2022-23 and 52 in 2023-24.
While his contract is considered one of the NHL’s worst right now, Huberdeau still has time to flip the narrative and get back to excelling like he did with the Panthers.
Honourable Mentions: Kris Letang, Jonathan Marchessault, David Perron
New Brunswick — Jake Allen
There aren’t many active players from New Brunswick, but current Devils goaltender Jake Allen certainly stands out as the most successful.
Since being chosen by the St. Louis Blues 34th overall in 2008, “Jake the Snake” has made 407 starts and has a career 198-168-42 record, 2.76 Goals Against Average, .907 Save Percentage, 24 shutouts, and is a two-time NHL All-Star.
Allen was relegated to backup duty after Jordan Binnington’s meteoric rise, and the Blues went from dead-last to Stanley Cup champion in 2018-19 with Binnington in the crease. Hence, Allen was traded to the Montreal Canadiens prior to 2020-21, where he played until the 2024 Trade Deadline in tandem with various goaltenders before being traded to the Devils.
Honourable Mention: Calvin Pickard
Nova Scotia — Sidney Crosby
He’s won three Stanley Cups. He’s won two Art Ross Trophies, Hart Trophies, and Ted Lindsay Awards each. He’s also won Lester B. Pearson, Maurice “Rocket” Richard” and Mark Messier Leader of the Year Awards. He’s been named an NHL All-Star 10 times. He’s won two Olympic golds — he, of course, scored the iconic “golden goal” in 2010 — and has won World Junior and World Cup of Hockey golds, too.
He’s Sidney Crosby. “The Great One.” The pride of Cole Harbour, Nova Scotia. Nobody in recent memory has single-handedly changed the fortunes of a franchise more than him.
Crosby, who is an elite passer who also owns perhaps the best backhand shot of all-time, has put 1,596 points in 1,272-career games and has reached the 100-point plateau in six separate seasons. He’s also recorded 201 points in 180 playoff games — including a whopping 31 in 2009 — when the Pittsburgh Penguins captured the Stanley Cup against the Detroit Red Wings in what was a rematch from the year prior.
Related: NHL’s Top 5 Centers of the 2010s
The Penguins qualified for the postseason for 16-straight seasons in the Crosby era from 2006-07 through 2021-22.
He’s not quite “Sid the Kid” anymore at age 36 and his legacy as one of the NHL’s best-ever and as a superb role model has now been firmly cemented. He seems to be aging like fine wine as he still put up 90-plus points in each of his past two campaigns, and as long as he can avoid the concussion problems which dogged him in the earlier part of last decade, he should continue to excel for a while yet.
Honourable Mentions: Alex Killorn, Nathan MacKinnon, Brad Marchand
Prince Edward Island — Noah Dobson
The Summerside-born Noah Dobson has blossomed into an impactful, top-pairing defenseman in his first five seasons with the Islanders.
Selected 12th overall in 2018, the 24-year-old is a smooth-skating and mobile blueliner with good all-around awareness who ate up huge minutes and put up 152 points in his three-year junior career with the Acadie-Bathurst Titan and later, the Rouyn-Noranda Huskies.
Related: Noah Dobson – 2018 NHL Draft Prospect Profile
In his first five seasons with the Islanders, he’s notched 40 goals and 151 assists in 317 games; he set a new career-high by racking up 70 points in 2023-24.
Honourable Mention: Zack MacEwen
Newfoundland and Labrador — Dawson Mercer
There are only two active NHLers from Newfoundland and Labrador and current Devil Dawson Mercer is the best.
The 2020 18th-overall pick has 64 goals and 131 points in 246 career games after breaking out with 56 points in 82 games in 2022-23.
Honourable Mention: Alex Newhook
Let the Debates Begin!
Do you agree with the selections? Comment below! Also, be sure to check out THW’s piece that highlights the Best NHL Player from Each U.S. State.
