Last night, in what seems to have been a largely bizarre and banal Awards Ceremony, the great and the good of the NHL – plus Commissioner Bettman – were all dressed up for the annual awards to be dished out.
The Colorado Avalanche’s Nathan MacKinnon won both the Hart Memorial Trophy (NHL Most Valuable Player, as voted by the Hockey Writers) and Ted Lindsay Award (Most Outstanding Player, as for voted by the players) for the first time.
You can’t go wrong by picking MacKinnon, although Tampa Bay’s Nikita Kucherov would have been an equally worthy choice.
Did the “Russian Factor” make the difference against the top points scorer? I’m sure people in his homeland may have their suspicions, but there were only four points between them (144 for Kucherov, 140 for MacKinnon) and so you can hardly say he was robbed. MacKinnon was immense for the Avs, yet again, and few would be surprised if this isn’t the last time he picks up these awards.
Connor Hellebuyck won the Vezina Trophy for the second time in his career (1st in 2020)
Another category where two Russians, Sergei Bobrovsky and Igor Shesterkin, had a decent case. We’ll leave the conspiracy theories behind and focus on a phenomenal season between the pipes by Hellebuyck (60 GP, 37 W, 2.39 GAA .921 SV%).
This time last year the focus was all on his contract status, with one year remaining on his current deal and most rumours pointing to the goalie – plus teammate Mark Scheifele – being moved along by the Winnipeg Jets. Instead, the Jets gave their fans a wonderful season-opening present on October 9th by signing both players to identical seven-year extensions with an average value of $8.5M.
The pair were part of a resurgent Jets team that finished second in the Central Division and, whilst a sudden 4-1 First Round exit at the hands of Colorado was a disappointing end, the season was an enormously enjoyable one in Winnipeg, capped off by Hellebuyck being awarded the Vezina Trophy.
Quinn Hughes won the Norris Trophy (best defenseman)
The first of the Hughes trio to capture a major award, the Mighty Quinn stood tall as the Canucks won their Division for the first time since the 2012-13 team made it five Northwest Divisions in a row.
He played all 82 regular season games, leading all defensemen in points (92) and assists (75).
Connor Bedard won the Calder Trophy (best rookie)
Bedard basically had one hand on the trophy from the opening game of the NHL season, such is the talent of last year’s Number One draft pick.
He had to clear a few hurdles along the way, not least missing time with a broken jaw and seeing the two main veteran forwards brought in to help quickly disappearing for one reason or another (Taylor Hall with an injury, Corey Perry with an off-ice ‘incident’). And the whole Chicago Blackhawks being awful thing.
The Minnesota Wild’s Brock Faber deservedly picked up a good share of first-placed votes (42) as well. There was a period during the middle of the season when some writers (admittedly, mainly those in Minnesota) were arguing for his case over Bedard if the Wild were able to make the play-offs and Faber had played significantly more games than his rival.
Minnesota’s drift to mediocrity put paid to that argument, although I’m no fan of penalising a rookie for being on a bad team anyway, and Bedard rightfully ended up with the trophy.
