Canucks make under-the-radar goalie move fans shouldn't ignore
The Vancouver Canucks are bringing in KHL goaltender Ilya Safonov for next season, according to a report posted this Thursday afternoon on X by Hockey News Hub.
The note states Safonov will not extend with Ak Bars Kazan and will sign with Vancouver, giving Adam Foote a fresh option in a crease that fell apart in 2025-26.
The timing tells you everything. Vancouver finished 32nd overall at 25-49-8, with a brutal minus-100 goal differential and a home record of 9-27-5.
Goaltending was the wound that wouldn't close. Kevin Lankinen carried the bulk of the load across 47 games and posted a .875 save percentage.
Thatcher Demko played just 20 games and finished at .895. Behind them, Nikita Tolopilo got 21 starts and stopped pucks at an .881 clip.
That's three goalies, zero answers. When the entire goaltending depth chart sits below .900, the front office doesn't have the luxury of waiting on internal fixes.
Why a KHL signing makes sense for the Canucks
Safonov is a name Canucks fans will need to learn fast, because the Russian market has become Vancouver's most realistic path to cheap, ready competition for the backup job.
Per the report, the deal is for next season. Vancouver's cap chart is already weighed down by Elias Pettersson at $11.6 million, so adding a low-cost goaltender out of the KHL is exactly the kind of move this roster needs.
The Canucks went 16-22-3 on the road and 4-6-0 in their last 10. Their final game was a 1-6 loss in Edmonton. A team allowing 3.9 goals per game can't keep handing starts to goalies who can't crack .900.
Is Safonov supposed to walk in and unseat Demko? No. But signing him puts pressure on Lankinen, who is heading into another year at $4.5 million after one of the worst statistical seasons of any high-usage NHL starter.
That's the read here. A team that scored just 216 goals all season needed something to change in net, and importing a goalie from Russia is the cheapest way to force that competition.
The original post is below. The wording is short, but in Vancouver, a sentence like that lands like a slap shot off the crossbar at 3 a.m.
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Now the real question. Does Ryan Johnson keep adding from Europe to fix the crease, or does he finally cut bait on one of the veterans already under contract?
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YESTERDAY
MAY 20, 2026
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| G | A | PTS | ||
| Dylan Coghlan | 1 | - | 1 | |
| Pavel Dorofeyev | 1 | - | 1 | |
| Nic Dowd | 1 | - | 1 | |
| Brett Howden | 1 | - | 1 | |
| Gabriel Landeskog | 1 | - | 1 | |
| Valeri Nichushkin | 1 | - | 1 | |
| Rasmus Andersson | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Ross Colton | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Jack Eichel | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Tomas Hertl | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Ben Hutton | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Nathan MacKinnon | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Mitch Marner | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Brandon Saad | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Colton Sissons | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Devon Toews | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Jack Ahcan | - | - | - | |
| Ivan Barbashev | - | - | - | |
| Brent Burns | - | - | - | |
| Jack Drury | - | - | - | |
| COMPLETE STATS | ||||