NHL Awards Show offers best of best
Finalists include Mcdavid, Doughty for ninth LV gala
The NHL Awards is celebrating its ninth season in Las Vegas, but for thefirsttimeahometownteamwill be eligible for some hardware.
The show Wednesday night won’t be exciting as last year, when the league announced the players the Golden Knights selected in the expansion draft, but Vegas will still be up for four of these major awards. Before the trophies get passed out though, here’s a breakdown of everything that will get handed out:
Hart Trophy — League MVP. The original trophy was donated to the NHL in 1923 by David Hart, the father of longtime Montreal Canadiens coach Cecil Hart. Los Angeles’ Anze Kopitar, New Jersey’s Taylor Hall and Colorado’s Nathan Mackinnon are up for this one.
Vezina Trophy — Best goaltender. Connor Hellebuyck (Winnipeg Jets), Pekka Rinne (Nashville Predators) and Andrei Vasilevskiy are the finalists.
Norris Trophy — Top defenseman. Drew Doughty (Los Angeles Kings), Victor Hedman (Tampa Bay Lightning) and P.K. Subban (Nashville Predators) are up for it this year.
Calder Trophy — Best rookie. Mathew Barzal (New York Islanders), Brock Boeser (Vancouver Canucks) and Clayton Keller (Arizona Coyotes) are this season’s contenders.
Selke Trophy — Top defensive forward. Patrice Bergeron (Boston Bruins), Sean Couturier (Philadelphia Flyers) and Anze Kopitar (Los Angeles Kings) are the 2018 finalists.
Jack Adams Award — Best coach. Good luck taking this one away from Gerard Gallant of the Golden Knights. Boston’s Bruce Cassidy and Colorado’s Jared Bednar are also finalists.
General Manager of the Year — Self explanatory. Like Gallant, expect Vegas’ George Mcphee to get strong consideration here. He’s joined by Kevin Cheveldayoff (Winnipeg Jets) and Steve Yzerman (Tampa Bay Lightning) as finalists.
Ted Lindsay Award — Most outstanding player as voted on by the members of the NHL Players’ Association. The winner of the
Hart has also won the Ted Lindsay Award the last four years. And the nominees are: Edmonton’s Connor Mcdavid, Hall and Mackinnon.
Lady Byng Trophy — “Most gentlemanly player.” Basically a sportsmanship award. Golden Knights forward William Karlsson is a finalist, along with Aleksander Barkov (Florida Panthers) and Ryan O’reilly (Buffalo Sabres).
Bill Masterton Memorial Trophy — Perseverance, sportsmanship and dedication to hockey. It will be handed out to either Brian Boyle (New Jersey Devils), Roberto Luongo (Florida Panthers) and Jordan Staal (Carolina Hurricanes) this year.
King Clancy Memorial Trophy — Humanitarian award. The award is named in honor of former Ottawa Senators and Toronto Maple Leafs player Francis M. “King” Clancy. Daniel and Henrik Sedin (Vancouver Canucks), Subban and Jason Zucker (Minnesota Wild) of Las Vegas are finalists.
Mark Messier NHL Leadership Award — Leadership qualities on and off the ice. Given to a player selected by Hockey Hall of Fame center Mark Messier. The Knights’ Deryk Engelland is a finalist, along with Philadelphia’s Wayne Simmonds and Winnipeg’s Blake Wheeler.
NHL Foundation Player Award — Community service award. The winner gets a $25,000 grant to help a cause he supports.
Contact Ben Gotz at bgotz@ reviewjournal.com. Follow @Bensgotz on Twitter.