The Vancouver Canucks won’t bring back head coach Rick Tocchet unless he signs a new contract with the hockey club, President of Hockey Operations Jim Rutherford announced on Monday. 

While the organization wants the 61-year-old head coach to return to the Canucks bench in 2025-26, they will not exercise their contract option for another season. Instead, they hope to come to a new deal with the man who has led the team since the midway through the 2022-23 campaign. 

“We don’t feel it’s right to have somebody here that may have his mind somewhere else, and I’d say that about anybody,” Rutherford told reporters at the end-of-season press conference. “This is not just about Tocchet, but we believe that Tocchet and his coaching staff did as good a job coaching this team this year as they did the year before, when he was the [Jack Adams] Coach of the Year.”

Rutherford admitted the two sides have been engaged in positive dialogue and that there is hope for clarity on the situation in the coming week. At the same time, the Canucks have come a long way as an organization in terms of how they are able to sign coaches. 

“I would suspect sometime this week, he’ll have a decision,” Rutherford added. “We have gone a long ways from where coaches have been compensated with the Canucks for years, forever, actually, and and we’re hoping that he takes that contract and stays.”

After amassing 109 points in 2023-24 and advancing to the second round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs, the Canucks struggled with injuries and locker room tension in 2024-25, all combining towards their 90-point season and missing the playoffs. 

“The incident [between Elias Pettersson and J.T. Miller] that happened affected the chemistry of the room and affected the play of the team in the first half, and forced the trade,” Rutherford said. “But, with all that going on, how [Tocchet]  handled the situation and how he handled the team was really good. I give him and his staff kudos for the job they did this year.”