Functional traits are widely used to explain plant performance including growth rate; however, how above- and below-ground traits coordinate in affecting resource acquisition, transportation, and utilization that jointly determine long-term tree growth remains understudied. In a common garden, we quantified stem radial growth rates based on tree-ring analyses and measured 24 economic and hydraulic traits of leaves, stems, coarse roots, and fine roots in 33 temperate broad-leaved tree species that co-occur in forests of Northeast China. Beyond testing individual trait-growth relationships, trait network and whole-plant economics spectrum (PES) analyses were used to uncover the physiological mechanism underlying growth rate differences across tree species. Across species, growth rate correlated positively with multiple functional traits: leaf photosynthetic rate (A_a), leaf mass per area (LMA), fine-root average diameter (AD), and hydraulic conductance in both above- and below-ground organs. Notably, the traits reflecting carbon assimilation and hydraulic efficiency consistently emerged as “hub traits” with high connectivity in the trait networks at both organ and whole-plant levels, and they also tended to show stronger linear correlations with growth rate. Our results revealed a PES ranging from an acquisitive strategy represented by higher carbon assimilation rate, more efficient water transport across organs, thicker fine roots, and lower wood tissue investment, associated with fast tree growth, to a conservative strategy represented by a combination of opposite trait values, associated with slow growth. Our findings highlight the predictive roles of individual traits related to carbon acquisition, water transportation, soil resource capture, and tissue investment on growth. The trait network and spectrum analyses further present a more integrative framework for explaining interspecific variation in tree growth rate, which provides novel and comprehensive insights into the mechanistic understanding and prediction of tree productivity at the species level from a trait-based perspective.