A Look At J.T. Miller’s Time As A Vancouver Canuck

The Vancouver Canucks were a different team when they first acquired J.T. Miller. In a deal made on June 22, 2019, the second day of the 2019 NHL Draft, Vancouver traded goaltender Marek Mazanec, a 2019 third-round pick, and a 2020 conditional first-round pick for Miller in a move that initially confused Canucks fans.

Nearly six years later, it’s clear that fans had nothing to worry about.

On Friday, January 31, Miller was traded to the New York Rangers, the team that drafted him 15th overall back in 2011. Heading to New York alongside him are Erik Brännström, who was acquired by Vancouver only a few months ago, and prospect Jackson Dorrington, who was picked in the sixth round of the 2022 NHL Draft. Centre Filip Chytil, defender Victor Mancini, and a top 13-protected 2025 first-round pick came to Vancouver in exchange. As Miller begins another journey with the Rangers, let’s take a look at the spectacular six years that he spent with the Canucks.

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Miller arrived in Vancouver fresh off a 47-point campaign with the Tampa Bay Lighting, who had just been swept in the first round of the 2019 Stanley Cup playoffs by the Columbus Blue Jackets. Stuck behind a lineup featuring Nikita Kucherov, Brayden Point, Steven Stamkos, and more, there wasn’t much opportunity for Miller to blossom offensively in Tampa Bay. In his first season with the Canucks, that offensive output flourished.

Once in Vancouver, Miller ended up on a line with Elias Pettersson and Brock Boeser — with the group eventually being referred to as the “lotto line,” as the popular BC lottery name matched the jersey numbers of the players. In 69 games, Miller led the team in points with 27 goals and 45 assists, both of which were career highs for him at the time. He scored his 100th career NHL goal during this season in a 7–2 victory against the Florida Panthers.

Despite the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic, Miller helped the team along to an eventual playoff berth in August of 2020. He averaged over a point per game put together in the team’s series’ against the Minnesota Wild, St. Louis blues, and Vegas Golden Knights, with six goals and 12 assists registered in 17 games played. At the end of their playoff run, he and Pettersson were tied for the team lead in scoring.

The 2020–21 regular season was a unique one, with the divisions reworked and the season shortened to 56 games. After the departures of Jacob Markström, Chris Tanev, Troy Stetcher, and Tyler Toffoli, the new-brand Canucks looked strikingly different. Nils Höglander played his first season with the big club, Nate Schmidt and Travis Hamonic joined the defence core, and Braden Holtby split starts with Thatcher Demko. The team had a new look to it, and as a result, required some time to gel. In a time of uncertainty, one consistent remained — Miller remained near the top of the team in points with 46 in 53 games, only second to Boeser on the season.

Miller really started to turn heads in the 2021–22 season, when he led the team in points by a 31-point margin. He was only a hair away from his first triple-digit points season, registering 99 in 80 games. He smashed his career-highs in goals and assists with 32 and 67 respectively, and logged his highest ever minutes on ice average with 21:05. During this year, he even received a fifth-place vote for the Hart Memorial Trophy. Miller did this all even with an organizational overhaul that led to former Head Coach Bruce Boudreau and current President of Hockey Operations Jim Rutherford joining the team.

This career-high season led Miller to sign a seven-year, $8M AAV contract on September 2, 2022. As one of, if not the team’s most consistent producer since arriving in Vancouver, Miller’s contract looked fair for the first few years. Of course, there were concerns with the length and salary later on in the deal, but Miller has always been consistent — even towards the end of his tenure with Vancouver, he was still averaging a point per game. This average continued through the 2022–23 regular season, which was the last year of the $5.25M AAV deal he signed with the Lightning back in 2018. His 32 goals and 50 assists were good for second in team scoring on the year. Despite this being another season without playoffs, Miller notched his 500th career point.

With former Canucks captain Bo Horvat traded in January of 2023, it was time for Miller and the other stars to show what they could do. In 2023, with a new captain and a roster turnover that saw only six players remain from the 2020 Stanley Cup bubble playoff run, Vancouver smashed all expectations and took hold of the Pacific Division with a 50–23–9 record. Miller was a key cog in this entire operation, breaking through the 100-point threshold for the first time in his career with 37 goals and 66 assists on the season and leading the team in point production. He was named to the NHL All-Star Game for the first time in his career alongside teammates Pettersson, Boeser, Demko, Quinn Hughes, and Elias Lindholm.

Miller was instrumental in Vancouver’s 2024 Stanley Cup playoff run. With three goals and nine assists in 13 games played, he was tied for first on the team in scoring with Boeser. If not for Miller, it’s unlikely that Vancouver would have been able to push their series against the Edmonton Oilers to seven games, as it was thanks to his defensive efforts that the team was able to lock down Oilers superstar Connor McDavid.

The playoffs were also the birthplace of the “J.T. Miller” chants, which became popular even after Vancouver was eliminated in game seven of the division finals. Following this series, the chants followed Miller any time he registered a point at Rogers Arena (or on the road, even), as well as at the WWE Survivor Series where Miller wasn’t even present.

Miller departs the Canucks organization with a plethora of accolades to his name. He finishes his 404-game tenure with 152 goals, 285 assists, and 437 points — putting him at 18th, 10th, and 11th in franchise history respectively. He also finishes 10th in franchise history in game-winning goals with 27, 22nd in mult-goal games with 17, 9th in multi-point games with 119, and ninth in multi-assist games with 59. His overtime records are nearly unparalleled, as he scored 10 overtime-winning goals for the Canucks, which put him second in franchise history to Daniel Sedin. As well, his nine shootout goals put him at fourth in the club’s history.

While Miller will undoubtedly be remembered for his Ryan Kesler-esque grit and powerful heart, he was also there to give the team some much-needed levity whenever they needed it. Last season, during a pre-playoff slump, he created the Conor Garland 400th NHL game shirts. During the team’s first-round playoff series against the Nashville Predators, he took to practice in Artūrs Šilovs’ trademark salmon-coloured shirt. As important as Miller was on the ice, he was even more impactful off of it.

Miller’s last goal with the Canucks came in their 5–2 victory against the St. Louis Blues on Monday night. His last point was registered on Wednesday, as he nabbed the second assist off Pius Suter’s empty-net goal. Miller ends his career as a Canuck with a points per game rate of 1.08, good for second in the team’s history behind Pavel Bure. Regardless of how his tenure with Vancouver ended, Miller was often at the forefront of the Canucks to success — without him, the team will be sorely missing a heart-and-soul leader.

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