Ice-Cold Takes (special edition): Completely correct predictions for NHL awards

Ice-Cold Takes is a weekly humor column that (usually) covers what is trending around the world of hockey. In this special edition of ICT, we’re focusing solely on the NHL Awards.

Are there still Stanley Cup stories floating around? Sure. Is the NHL Draft the most important news piece from this week? Likely. Has the offseason gotten off to a hot start? Yes. Do the NHL awards actually mean anything? Probably not. Which is exactly why we’re skipping over the important stuff and dedicating an entire column to them.

In this special edition of Ice-Cold Takes, we’ll break down Wednesday night’s NHL awards. Consider this column your cheat sheet for your award pools and/or crippling gambling addiction. (Seriously? You’re betting on this?)

In this week’s column, we’ll go through each of the coveted NHL awards and tell you who is going to win and who is definitely going to lose. Having spent the last five minutes or so researching the subject, I feel confident in my answers.

Follow me into the most in-depth NHL awards breakdown you’ll find on the internet and let us both be prosperous through the most meaningless three hours of television you’ll watch this week.

Vezina Trophy – Best goaltender

Winner: Regular season Pekka Rinne. Rinne was fantastic all season long. He posted a .927 save percentage along with a 2.31 goals against average in 42 wins on 59 starts. He led the Nashville Predators into the playoffs with the best record in the NHL. The numbers speak for themselves.

Loser: Playoff Pekka Rinne. I know the playoffs don’t play into the decision but you just can’t have the Vezina Trophy winner playing that poorly on such a huge stage! It’s a bad look for the league, even if the Winnipeg Jets have one of the most potent offenses we’ve seen in recent history. I hope Hellebuyck gets it.

Frank J. Selke Trophy – Best defensive forward

No one on earth is kicking themselves more than I am for predicting that Sean Couturier was going to win this award in a post from March, when Patrice Bergeron was injured with a cloudy timetable for return. No one. Let’s hope the personal curse I carry proves me wrong again and Bergeron takes home his record-breaking fifth Selke Trophy.

Winner: Patrice Bergeron. Just rename the trophy already. Patrice Bergeron is the Wayne Gretzky of two-way play. He’s the greatest defensive forward in NHL history and he’s probably going to win this award until he retires.

Loser: Me. For doubting Bergeron’s resume this season when he was briefly injured in March. I’ll never forgive myself for this. I’d like this to serve as my formal apology to Patrice and his family and friends. Oh, and Anze Kopitar is also a loser here because the third nominee should have been Aleksander Barkov.

Norris Trophy – Best defenseman

Winner: Victor Hedman will take home the hardware in this category. Not the most flashy pick, but he was so good this season. As great as I think P.K. Subban is now that he no longer plays for the Habs, he benefited from playing with the best defensive group in the league.

Loser: All of us who have to watch Victor Hedman get an award. Maybe he is an interesting person  in real life but it certainly doesn’t seem that way. Prove me wrong, Victor.

Lady Byng Trophy – Most gentlemanly player

This one is harder to judge without being in the NHL’s inner-circle. Thankfully, the Internet gives us access to anyone in the world through a simple slide into the DMs. Let’s see if we can get some inside info from Frank Vatrano:

Unfortunately, Frank was probably too busy preparing an NHL awards viewing party or something. Oh well. Barkov is our pick to win.

Bill Masterson Memorial Trophy – Dedication to hockey

Winner: Brian Boyle. While I love all three players in this category, Boyle’s story is just incredible. He returned to hockey in November after being diagnosed with myeloid leukemia just two months prior. He went on to have one of the better seasons of his career with the New Jersey Devils in 2017/18. Also, the smile on his face as he was scrumming with Mikael Sergachev was one of the best 2018 playoff moments.

Calder Memorial Trophy – Best rookie

Winner and notable snub from this award: Charlie McAvoy. Though, Mathew Barzal will win the Calder Trophy and is probably deserving of it. Regardless of the facts, this column will view Charlie McAvoy as the 2017/18 Calder Trophy recipient as the best rookie in his class.

McAvoy averaged more than 22 minutes of ice time per game, most often alongside Zdeno Chara on the Bruins top defensive pairing. He had 32 points in 63 games and was a plus-20 in his first season. He’s already a shut down defender in the NHL and is only 20-years-old. But whatever, give it to Barzal.

Mark Messier NHL Leadership Award – Leadership, duh.

Winner: Blake Wheeler. Wheeler is one of, if not the best captain in the NHL. He led a young Jets team deeper than they have ever been in the NHL playoffs and they should probably be regarded as the early favorites for the Stanley Cup in 2019.

You could say Wheeler’s storied NHL career shaped him into the leader he is today. However, most people who know him say that his first three seasons in the NHL are what truly made him into the great person and leader we see on the ice in Winnipeg.

Jack Adams Award – Coach of the year

Winner: Gerard Gallant. No surprises here. As great as Bruce Cassidy and Jared Bednar were this season, Gerard Gallant is 2018’s darling NHL coach. It’s unbelievable how he took a team of second-line players with the hottest goalie in he NHL to the Stanley Cup final.

Did you sense the sarcasm in that last sentence? People are seriously saying that. They are saying that Vegas wasn’t an incredible story. The Golden Knights story is amazing and Gallant is a great head coach who is deserving of the award. Consider this, though: Gerard Gallant lost a Stanley Cup final this season, Bruce Cassidy didn’t. Edge Cassidy?

Ted Lindsay Award – Best player as voted by the NHLPA

I always found this award to be the best of the bunch. The player who is voted the best in the league by his peers. The Ted Lindsay Award should take center stage as the most coveted prize of the night, as it is a direct show of respect from fellow players as opposed to what a bunch of writers think.

Winner: It’s going to be McJesus until he retires. The players are in a state of constant awe whenever he does anything cool on the ice (every game) and it’s going to show as he collects this award for the next 10-15 seasons.

King Clancy Memorial Trophy – PLAYER who best exemplifies leadership qualities

While yours truly is tired of hearing about the Sedin twins, they’ll probably end up winning this award. Notice the capitalized word in the description doesn’t have an “s” at the end of it?

Maybe it isn’t a big deal. Maybe everyone thinks it’s neat for the Sedin twins to be doing something together once again. Not me. I’m sick of these two and the way they get paired-up for everything. Henrik has already won the award (2016) so just give it to Daniel this year.

I hope P.K. Subban wins this award. He deserves it (okay, they all deserve it). At least Subban can play anywhere without his brother having to come with him. That’s right, I’m giving no love to the Sedin brothers and I’m not sorry about it.

General Manager of The Year

Winner: George McPhee, Vegas Golden Knights. Let’s not even waste our time looking at anyone else.

Bonus: If they had a worst general manager of the year award, it would most definitely go to a Canadian team. Not naming any names, though (looking at you, Ottawa, Montreal and Edmonton).

Hart Memorial Trophy – MVP

Right off the bat I can tell you who is not going to win. Anze Kopitar. As great as Kopitar was this season and as good as his two-way game is, the other two names in this category are far more enticing. Kopitar is good but if we’re being real, the third nominee should have been

Brad Marchand

Nikita Kucherov.

Why Nathan MacKinnon will win: MacKinnon took the bottom-feeding Avalanche to a six-game playoff series with the best regular season team in the Western Conference. He had four more points than Taylor Hall (97) in two less games (74). He also led the NHL in game winners (12) and was second only to Connor McDavid in points per game (1.31).

Why Taylor Hall will win: Hall led a sub-par New Jersey Devils team to a six game playoff series with the best regular season team in the Eastern Conference (Woah, deja vu). Hall rattled-off a very impressive 26-game point streak, during which he had 38 points.

Next: 25 most insane things people have ever done with the Stanley Cup

My guess would be that they’ll give the Hart Trophy to Nathan MacKinnon, who’s numbers are slightly better. It’s worth noting that barring his injury, Patrice Bergeron would have made this his second award win of the evening.

We’ll be back to regular NHL trends next week. Until then, enjoy the NHL awards and keep your head up!