[azicet]

It seems like only yesterday the NHL season started, (and thanks to the lockout, it was yesterday that the season started! LOL) Time for year end awards:

Hart: Alex Ovechkin. I hate giving the devil his due, (he's such an arrogant jerk in person), but he lead the NHL in goals & more importantly, led his team to a division title by carrying it on his back. Honorable mention goes to John Tavares for doing the same but with WAY less talent around him.

Fart: Tanner Glass, (yes that is a real person). 48 games played, 1 goal, 1 assist -11. On the freaking Penguins no less!

Norris: Kris Letang. 33 assists in 35 games and an impressive +16. As if the Penguins weren't stacked enough, this guy becomes the premier defenseman in the league.

Steven Segal: Erik Gudbranson. 0 goals, 4 assists, a league worst -22, playing 32 games. Sadly, playing on the Panthers, those are actually good numbers.

Vezina: Tuukka Rask. This is a toughie, especially with Lundqvist playing well down the stretch & Bobrovsky playing lights out, though coming up just short of a playoff berth. Rask gets the nod for posting similar stats playing in a tough division on a team with high expectations & replacing arguably the best goalie statistic-wise in Tim Thomas & coming up aces.

V#gina: Seymon Varmalov: 21 losses, a 3.02 GAA & one of the main reasons the Avs are picking 1st in the NHL lottery. Seth Jones will have a LOT of sleepless nights next year.

Jack Adams: Joel Quenville. Chicago was going to be good, but THIS good? Even without a "name" goalie, (I mean Corey Crawford & Ray Emery? Really?), the team played hard, won a ton of games & outplayed practically everyone they faced. Good coaching can do that.

Jack @$$: John Cooper. Martin St. Louis lead the NHL in scoring. Steve Stamkos led the NHL in goals up until the last 2 weeks of the season & this team still lost as many games as they did? At least Florida has an excuse of having little talent & Edmonton has the excuse of inexperience. There's no excuse for Tampa.

Calder: Jonathan Huberdeau. Very disappointing rookie crop this year with no real standouts. Huberdeau gets the nod over Yakupov & the others simply by putting up good numbers on a really lousy team.

Caldor: Chris Krieder. Figures I pull his rookie cards as if they were commons & he ends up playing like a common with 2 stints in the minors on a team desperate for scoring. Real disappointment.

Biggest surprise: The NY Islanders. Raise your hand if you predicted this team would not only finish above 14th place, but make the playoffs. Put all those hands down you liars! John Tavares & Evgeni Nabokov have taken a team of waiver wire pickups, disappointing 1st round busts, and not one but 2 goalies on the roster, (DiPietro & Tim Thomas), making a combined $10 million doing nothing, and made them a playoff team. Wow.

Biggest disappointment: Ryan Nugent-Hopkins. 4 goals in 40 games? After scoring 18 in 62 last year? He was the poster boy for "sophomore jinx" this year. Hopefully he'll turn it around next year, or else all hat money I poured in his rookie cards next year will be flushed down the Milbury.

Your thoughts?

[rayeates]

Haha! Great write-up and I agree with most of them! I would like to think that Therrien had more of an impact on his team than Quennville. He took the 28th place Habs and turned them into Divisional Champions. The only difference that he had to work with was two rookies, a fighter, and one of the most injured defensemen in league history added to a team that could not win last season.

That, and he joined the team expecting to have time to work with the players... only to be shunned by the lockout. He literally has four days to get them familiar with his style, but he kept on them game-in and game-out! End result? The fourth-best team in the league! I would say that this is reason enough!

Thanks for the read!

Randi

[greg2424]

My thoughts? You obviously didn't see the Habs play all year.

Subban led the league in defensemen scoring and he didn't have Crosby or Kunitz to feed off of.

Although I did not see Huberdeau play, Gallagher was a STAR. He had 15 goals to Huberdeau's 14 and he was a +10 to Huberdeau's -15. Huberdeau only led Gallagher with 4 more assists despite playing 4 more games and averaging 3 min more per game.

As for coach of the year; I think Therrien has a shot based on the team's improvement although it is hard to overlook the success of the Hawks.

[phildo37]

You gotta give a nod to Kronwall for Norris. And definitely Babcock for Jack Adams... losing Lidstrom, Sturat, Holmstrom, and Hudler and still making the playoffs with a lot of really young guys - can't overlook that.

And, you can't lay Guy Boucher's problems at John Cooper's feet..

[arod1973]

Too bad Kane and Toews will split votes for the Hart...would love to see a Hawk win especially since they were the best team throughout the season...

[rjcj2017]

Can't forget this one:

H-A_-A-K Award (Top current Beckett.com hockey mod) — Randi, by the slimmest of margins