Canucks fans’ response to Hughes’ return was (rightfully) tamer than Tkachuk’s:
Despite the fact that the trade happened almost a year ago, Quinn Hughes finally played his first game against the Vancouver Canucks in Vancouver after he was dealt to the Minnesota Wild. There were some expectations that it would carry similar weight to Brady Tkachuk’s return to Ottawa earlier in the week, but at the same time, it was a much less volatile situation. In the end, Canucks fans had more fun at the expense of the Wild themselves than Hughes with the contract situation, the former captain had a (mostly) warm welcome, and he even got the last laugh with the Wild winning and him notching his 500th career point by scoring the eventual game-winning goal.
Tyler Yaremchuk and Carter Hutton talked about Hughes return to Vancouver on Daily Faceoff Live.
Tyler Yaremchuk: The crowd in Vancouver was not nearly as spicy as it was in Ottawa. The one chant that gave me a chuckle was not even so much directed at Quinn, more directed at Minnesota Wild fans, with the Canucks fans chanting, “he’s not signing”.
I’m not surprised, though. I think Hughes left under totally different circumstances than Tkachuk in Ottawa. Vancouver was filled with dysfunction. You had the Pettersson-Miller thing. They were a team that was on the downturn. They fired Rick Tocchet. All of that mess went into Hughes leaving. Also, he had a year and a half left, and he was basically saying, “I’m not re-signing there”.
Tkachuk is different because he was on a team that was on the upswing. They were making the playoffs. They had a good young core. He had been I think more of an emotional leader for that franchise and for that fan base to look at. So I do think the situations were different. I wasn’t totally surprised to see the response for Quinn be a lot tamer than Ottawa’s response for Brady.
Carter Hutton: Yeah, I agree. I think that whole scenario is so different in a sense. Where they were going, what they were doing. And the Brady one, it was the lead-on that he had stated so many times about his commitment to the organization and he was going to win, and he wore it on his sleeve. Quinn was always this super awkward, quiet, standoffish guy, you never really knew the situation behind the curtain.
You can watch the full episode here…
