More than four decades after it all started for Jim Rutherford, it is hard to say this is how he thought it would all go. The now-former Vancouver Canucks president of hockey operations began his management career in 1984, when Detroit businessman Peter Karmanos asked him to take over the Windsor Spitfires just a year after Rutherford retired from playing. Karmanos had hired Rutherford in 1983 to help run the minor hockey program he had been investing in for years, with a simple ambition: first own an OHL team, then an NHL team.
That ambition led to a Hall of Fame life for Rutherford. Three Stanley Cups, ownership, relocation, a split with Karmanos, and ultimately disappointment in the one truly Canadian market where he worked. "I'm disappointed about what's happened in Vancouver because I really like it here," he said last week, shortly before the Sedins were confirmed as the Canucks' new co-presidents, with Ryan Johnson taking over as general manager.
A Career of Highs and Lows
Rutherford wanted to do more. Hired to fix a big mess in 2021-22, he and general manager Patrik Allvin had the Canucks seemingly steered in the right direction within two years. Two years later, it all blew up. The star centres had a major falling out, the superstar defenceman left, and the team is now in a full-on rebuild. It is a bittersweet end to an illustrious career. Yet Rutherford, who will spend the final year of his contract as a senior adviser to the Sedins and Johnson, keeps his head high.
"I'm really happy that I came to a Canadian market and I'm thankful for all the people I've met here — a lot of great people — and I learned what a passionate and great fan base we have," he said. "So I'm happy to be part of that, as at the end of the day, when I sit down and look at my history. I'm happy that for four years, Vancouver was on that." He added, "I recognize the great fan base, and I would certainly have liked to seen it better for them. But when I sit down, I look at my overall career, not just my last few years, and whatever my last day of work is, whether it's an adviser or whatever it is, I can end my career. I'm a guy that's done something that not many guys have done. Almost won a Memorial Cup. I won a Calder Cup, three Stanley Cups, and made it to the Hall of Fame. I would have never imagined that when I was a teenager, hoping that I could just play one game in the NHL."
What Went Wrong in Vancouver?
Rutherford and Karmanos took over Windsor, who were bankrupt, and had them in the Memorial Cup final within three years. They built an OHL expansion team in Detroit that nearly won the Memorial Cup. They bought the Hartford Whalers and, although they moved the team to Carolina, look at the Hurricanes now. He won two Stanley Cups in Pittsburgh. So what went wrong in Vancouver? Destiny, in the end, took charge. You make choices and think they are right — Rick Tocchet was coach of the year in 2024 and Allvin was runner-up for GM of the year, Rutherford reminds us — and yet, sometimes things are just out of your control.
"Well there's always challenges whether you're winning or losing," he begins. "But certainly the challenges seem to go a little smoother when you're winning. When I came here and I looked at things from 30,000 feet, I thought there was a chance to take this team to bigger heights than we got to. Was pretty pleased with the fact that we won the division a couple of years ago. And then we dealt with three critical situations. One, Thatcher (Demko) getting hurt (in the 2024 playoffs), the Miller situation, and then Quinn getting hurt knowing that he was leaving. So then that gets us to the point we are today, even though it doesn't feel good in a lot of ways for everybody, it was an inevitable place that this franchise was going to have to go to."
"These are the key ones. Everybody knows what a difference those guys were. Miller was the driver of the team on the offence as a forward, and Quinn was the driver of the team on defence. So those are just big pieces, you can't just automatically turn around and replace."
