Hello sports fans. I am back here in Novosibirsk, where locals have sheltered in place for the coronavirus pandemic. It seems that everyone is watching old videos of President Vladimir Putin playing hockey against retired KHL and NHL Russian players. This may actually be a requirement of all citizens of mother Russia. Thankfully he had put on his shirt while playing hockey.
With the CCHL season over, it’s time to announce the end of season awards. What a season it was as we had the top 2 teams, Fort Erie and local Siberia, fighting it out until the last game to see who would get the top seed. Both ended up with an impressive 126 points, but Fort Erie won the tie breaker. We saw these two titans make it to the finals with minimal losses and we were treated to a heck of a series!
The Icecats looked like they were going to sweep the Falcons after taking a 3-0 lead in games, but the tough as nails Falcons fought back with back-to-back wins. Siberia ultimately took game 6 and with that win brought home the first ever Kehler Cup to Siberia. Captain McDavid has been drinking vodka from the Kehler Cup ever since!
We had a lot of worthy nominees for the end of season awards. Without further ado, let’s look at the award winners.
Lady Byng - given to the most gentlemanly player
· Derek Ryan – CGY: 6 PIMs in 82 games
· Ryan O’Reilly – SPR: 6 PIMs in 82 games… wow, that’s amazing for this tough player
· Brandon Saad - VIC: 6 PIMs in 82 games… I see a pattern here!
· William Karlsson - SUD: 0 PIM in 82 games…are you kidding me, not a single penalty???
· AND THE WINNER IS: William Karlsson won by a landslide, winning 90% of the votes
Selke - given to the best defensive forward
· Mark Stone - SIB: Led the league in +/- with +40 and tied for 4th in scoring, the guy can do it all
· Gabriel Landeskog - ISL: +34 and played defensively responsible hockey for a tough SPR team
· Joe Pavelski – FOR: great 2-way center who finished with a +31
· AND THE WINNER IS: Mark Stone, won by 5 votes ahead of a tie for runner up between Gabriel Landeskog and Ryan O’Reilly
Calder - given to the best rookie (min 20 games played in NHL 2017-18 season to qualify)
· Elias Pettersson - WIS: The Swedish wiz put up 60 points in 82 games for a team that struggled all year
· Jordan Binnington - GEO: The rookie netminder had 23 wins, 2.92 GAA and a .908 S% for the Millers
· Anthony Cirelli - LAS: The young 2-way forward managed 48 points in only 53 games for Vegas
· Erik Cernak - DRT: This young defenseman put up a very respectable 38 points in 73 games and was a +14
· AND THE WINNER IS: Elias Pettersson, who was 8 votes ahead of runner up, Anthony Cirelli
Norris - given to the best defenseman
· Brent Burns - SIB: the Siberia rearguard led the league with 98 points in 82 games, +23
· Jacob Trouba - VIC: this tough, 2-way dman was second in the league with 93 points in 81 games
· Ryan McDonagh - WIS: the veteran defender was third in the league with 92 points in 82 games
· AND THE WINNER IS: Brent Burns, who won by 3 votes over runner up Jacob Trouba
Vezina - given to the best goaltender
· Ben Bishop - SPR: The veteran netminder settled into Springfield and led the league with a .911 S%
· Pekka Rinne - DAY: the big, Finnish netminder had a strong season and led the league with 45 wins
· John Gibson - FOR: John was a key member of the Falcons, finishing with the 2nd lowest GAA 2.67 and led the league with 5 shutouts
· Matt Murray – SIB: Matt had a very strong finish to the year, ending with the lowest GAA in the league at 2.66 and second in the league in wins
· AND THE WINNER IS: Matt Murray, by one vote over Pekka Rinne and 2 votes over John Gibson. This was a close battle between 3 great goaltenders!
Jennings - given to the team/goalies with the fewest goals against
· FOR: finished with a league low 222 goals against
· SIB: came in second with 232 goals against
· SUD: rounded out the top 3 with 243 goals against
· AND THE WINNER IS: Fort Erie (John Gibson and Anton Khudobin) by a landslide!
Now we have the 2 biggest awards, the Hart and Con Smythe trophies. The Hart trophy is given to the player who is the most valuable to his team in the regular season
· Connor McDavid - SIB: the young captain was great from the start of the season to the end, leading Siberia to the Kehler Cup. Connor led the league with 135 points, 22 greater than the next closest player.
· Nikita Kucherov – REK: The Russian winger had a great season for first year GM, Maxime. Nikita was second in the league with 113 points.
· Patrik Kane - HAM: the veteran winger led the Tigers to a first-round bye and into the Canosa Conference finals. He was third in the league with 101 points.
· Mitch Marner – FOR: The young Falcons winger was tops on his team in scoring, leading the Falcons to the best record in the regular season
· AND THE WINNER IS: Connor McDavid, who won 81% of the votes!
Finally, we have the Conn Smythe trophy, given to the most valuable player in the playoffs
· Connor McDavid – SIB: Captain McDavid led his Icecats to the Kehler Cup, scoring 24 points in the playoffs
· Nathan McKinnon – FOR: Fort Erie’s young star had a great playoff run, scoring 22 points and led his team to the Kehler Cup finals
· Matt Murray – SIB: Murray was a wall in goal during the playoffs, leading all goalies with a GAA of 2.55 and .918 S%. He was one of the main reasons that the Icecats were able to overcome the high-powered Falcons
· AND THE WINNER IS: Connor McDavid by 1 vote over Matt “the wall” Murray
Well sports fans, there you have it, the awards for the 2019-2020 CCHL Season. The Cup winning Icecats were well represented in the awards and there were some close races! Many questions loom for next season. Will we see a repeat of this year’s finals, Clash of the Titans 2? Will we see other teams load up to challenge the Cats for the Cup? How will the retirement of the legendary Bill Corfield impact the balance of power in the Corfield conference? Stay tuned and until then, stay cold!
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