The Vancouver Canucks head into the 2025-26 season hoping to bounce back from a campaign where they fell from their Pacific Division penthouse and missed the playoffs. After a relatively quiet offseason where they only added Evander Kane up front and Pierre-Olivier Joseph on defence, they will be banking on their core stepping up and returning them to contender status.
Related: 3 Changes the Canucks Need to Make to Get Back to the Playoffs
As we get closer to training camp, the preseason, and finally opening night against the Calgary Flames, I will continue to get you set for the 2025-26 season with the player preview series, which got started early in the offseason with Aatu Raty and recently featured Nils Hoglander. Next on the docket is Linus Karlsson, who was instrumental in the Abbotsford Canucks’ march to the Calder Cup and will get a big opportunity to become a full-time NHLer this season.
Linus Karlsson
- Age: 25
- How Acquired: Trade with the San Jose Sharks in 2019 for Jonathan Dahlen
- 2024-25 Stats: 3 goals and 6 points in 23 games (Vancouver); 23 goals and 39 points in 32 games (Abbotsford regular season); 14 goals and 26 points in 24 games (Abbotsford Calder Cup Playoffs)
- 2025-26 Contract Status: Year one of a one-year one-way contract worth $775,000 average annual value (AAV)
2024-25 Season Recap
Karlsson split his time last season between Vancouver and Abbotsford, getting into a career-high 23 games in the NHL. He also scored his first three goals in the league, potting his first against Juuse Saros and the Nashville Predators on Jan. 29, finishing off a nice feed from Tyler Myers at the lip of the crease. He played mostly in the bottom six alongside Teddy Blueger and Drew O’Connor (61:53 ice time) or Nils Aman and Jonathan Lekkerimaki (29:39 ice time). All in all, when he was in Vancouver, he was a utility player who showed flashes of offence, but nothing too special.
In the American Hockey League (AHL), however, Karlsson was a beast and often Abbotsford’s best player. He only played 32 games, but still put up 23 goals and 39 points for a 1.21 point-per-game average, putting him on pace for close to 88 points over a full 72-game season. He now has 70 goals and 148 points in 164 AHL games – all in Abbotsford – making him the leading point-getter in Abbotsford Canucks history.
Karlsson then turned it up to 11 in the Calder Cup Playoffs, scoring more than half his regular season goals in only 24 games. He broke a Swedish forward record with 14 goals, easily usurping Andreas Johnsson and Mikael Andersson, who shared it with only 10. If not for Arturs Silovs’ brilliance, he probably would have walked away with the AHL MVP award. In fact, they should have split the honour, since without his consistent offence, Abbotsford wouldn’t have been Calder Cup champions for the first time in their history.
2025-26 Season Role & Expectations
Karlsson will be battling Abbotsford teammates Arshdeep Bains, Max Sasson, Nils Aman, and Ty Mueller in training camp for a spot on the opening night roster. Even though he is holding a one-way contract for this season, that doesn’t mean he won’t be placed on waivers. Considering Bains, Aman, and Kravtsov are also fighting to avoid that fate before Oct. 9’s opener against the Calgary Flames, he will have to showcase more of his AHL self rather than the average bottom-sixer he was in the NHL last season. If he can do that, he adds a lot more two-way value than Aman and Bains (although, you could probably say the same about him, too), and should make it onto the team.
If Karlsson impresses enough and secures one of the final spots on the roster, he could be a breakout candidate this season. While he hasn’t solved the NHL puzzle yet when it comes to his offence, he’s shown progression every time he’s been called up to Vancouver. Former head coach Rick Tocchet even compared him favourably to Tomas Holmstrom, one of – if not the best – net front presences in NHL history. That’s high praise. While we shouldn’t expect Karlsson to hit that ceiling this season, if he can show more of his Holmstrom side with the Orca on his chest rather than Johnny Canuck, he could be a very valuable piece of the bottom-six and second-unit power play.
Bottom line, at 25 years old and with three solid AHL seasons under his belt, Karlsson is ready to take the next step in his development and should be expected to at least be a full-time NHLer in 2025-26, not the yo-yo he was last season.
Final Stat Prediction
Karlsson has a very good chance of taking the final spot on the fourth line next to Blueger/Aatu Raty and O’Connor out of training camp, linemates he’s either had in Abbotsford (Raty) or Vancouver (Blueger and O’Connor). Assuming he does, and plays most of the season, I am projecting 10 goals and 20 points.
Other Canucks 2025-26 Player Previews
