A day after making a trade to free up salary cap space, the Vancouver Canucks used those savings Thursday to sign forward Dakota Joshua to a four-year extension.
Re-signing Joshua to a pact that will see him earn $3.25 million annually is the latest development in what's already been an active offseason for the Canucks with free agency starting Monday.
On Wednesday, they re-signed center Teddy Blueger to a two-year contract worth $1.8 million annually. That same day, they traded forwards Sam Lafferty and Ilya Mikheyev to the Chicago Blackhawks with a 2027 fourth-round pick going in the other direction.
It was a trade that allowed Vancouver to create an additional $4 million in cap space with Mikheyev having two years left on his contract worth $4.75 million annually as the Canucks retained $712,500 while Lafferty is a pending unrestricted free agent.
Free agent appeared to be a potential destination for Joshua, who emerged to have his strongest season. He scored a career-high 18 goals and 32 points in 63 games for a Vancouver team that went from missing the playoffs in 2022-23 to emerging as a serious Western Conference challenger in 2023-24.
Joshua's regular-season success carried over into the postseason, where he scored four goals and eight points in 13 games. He finished tied for third on the team in playoff games and was tied for fifth in points as the Canucks came within a game of advancing to the Western Conference finals before they were eliminated in seven games by the eventual Stanley Cup runner-up Edmonton Oilers.
Agreeing to a new deal with Joshua now means Vancouver can turn its attention elsewhere.
CapFriendly projects the Canucks have $15.040 million in cap space as they seek to address their needs. Among those needs is figuring out what they will do with a trio of pending UFAs in forward Elias Lindholm and defensemen Tyler Myers and Nikita Zadorov.
Lindholm scored six goals and 12 points in 26 games after arriving in a trade with the Calgary Flames. His strongest performances, however, came during Vancouver's playoff run that saw him finish with five goals and 10 points in 13 games in the final season of a contract that saw him earn $4.85 million annually over six seasons.
Myers, who has been with the club since the 2019-20 season, also had his best year with the franchise. He scored five goals and 29 points for his sixth 20-point campaign with his five-year deal worth $6 million a year also came to an end.
As for Zadorov, he arrived in a separate trade from the Flames earlier this season. His five goals and 14 points in 54 games set the stage for him to become one of the Canucks' most consistent playoff performers. Like Joshua, he scored four goals and eight points in 13 games and is in the final year of a two-year contract that carried a $3.75 million AAV.