The Vancouver Canucks have landed their man.
On Monday night, the Canucks announced that Manny Malhotra has been promoted from AHL Abbotsford to replace Adam Foote as Vancouver’s head coach.
Across a house-cleaning that’s been defined by a run of internal promotions, Vancouver has once again reached into the Fraser Valley and promoted the top internal candidate. Malhotra, like new Vancouver co-presidents Henrik and Daniel Sedin and general manager Ryan Johnson, is a former Canucks player associated with the franchise’s Mike Gillis-led golden era.
Malhotra began his coaching career in Vancouver as an assistant coach on Travis Green’s coaching staff nine years ago. He has served as the head coach of the AHL Canucks for the past two seasons, leading Abbotsford to a Calder Cup victory in 2025, the only professional hockey championship the franchise has ever won.
The 46-year-old also served as an assistant coach for the Toronto Maple Leafs on Sheldon Keefe’s staff for four seasons from 2020 to 2024.
In the summer of 2025, in a one-on-one interview The Athletic conducted with Malhotra, we asked him to reflect on the biggest takeaway he had as a head coach from winning the Calder Cup.
“The biggest thing (I learned) coaching-wise, and I suppose it’s understood, or common knowledge,” Malhotra said, “but as a coach we ask guys to do certain things or to play a certain way. You can demand it, you can ask it. Ultimately, however, it’s the player’s decision about whether they want to do it or not.
“Looking at how the season went and how the playoffs went and watching the evolution of our group and understanding how the team bought into it. By the end of it, they policed themselves. They drove the bus. They were committed to doing whatever it took to win. They got a taste of winning, they wanted to win, and they liked it. For me, it’s that understanding that we can ask players whatever we want, but until they’re committed, or to use the cliche term ‘bought in,’ nothing can really happen.”
There’s a tacit humility to that answer. An understanding of both what it takes to win as a coach and how dependent winning is on the group of players you’re working with.
Now Malhotra will see if he can replicate that level of buy-in at the NHL level in Vancouver as the Canucks continue their rebuild.
