The NHL announced the Vezina Trophy finalists for the best goaltender in the NHL. All of them are first time finalists for the award. Those are Jacob Markstrom, Juuse Saros, and Igor Shesterkin . Let’s take a deeper look at these netminders.
Markstrom plays for the Calgary Flames. His overall record this season was 37-15-9. The wins were 4th in the NHL. His goals against average stood at 2.22 with a save percentage of .922 and 9 shutouts. The shutouts led the league this year among goaltenders.
With his play in net, the Flames finished with a record of 50-21-11 for a total of 111 points. They won the Pacific Division for the first time since 2019. Without Markstrom playing so well, the Flames may not be a top seed in the NHL playoffs. He deserves consideration.
Saros is the starting goaltender for the Nashville Predators. Saros had one more win than Markstrom’s at 38. Saros was seeing the puck well this season giving up 2.64 goals against. His save percentage ended at .918. Both of these stats are lower than Markstrom.
Overall though, Saros helped Nashville finish 45-30-7, a total of 97 points. They were the second Wild Card team in the Western Conference. Unfortunately for Saros, he didn’t finish the regular season due to an ankle sprain. This is very unusual for the NHL to come out and say what the injury was. They keep that under the radar as either an upper body or lower body injury. The injury occurred during Nashville’s 5-4 overtime loss to Calgary on April 28th. This kept him out of Nashville’s first-round series as well.
Saros was missed during Nashville’s first- round loss to Colorado. The Avalanche swept Nashville, outscoring them 21-9. If Saros was in net, it may not have been such a quick series. It shows how valuable Saros was to the team.
Shesterkin plays for the New York Rangers. He had the least amount of wins of the three at 36. His goals against average and save percentage was the best out of the three. His goals against average was 2.07 and his save percentage stood at .935. With his play, New York finished at 52-24-6 for a total of 110 points, 2nd in the Metropolitan Division. The Rangers made the postseason for the 1st time since 2017. Technically they earned a spot in the qualifying round in the 2020 NHL playoffs. That season was finished in the bubble due to the COVID19 Pandemic. New York was swept by the Carolina Hurricanes in the best of 5 series.
All of these goaltenders’ statistics justify they should be in the conversation for the award. The winner to me is Shesterkin. I understand he had the fewest wins of the 3 but stopped the puck more and didn’t allow as many goals. What more do you want from a goaltender? The NHL will announce the winner later in the postseason. No matter who wins it, all of these goaltenders played well for their respective teams.
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