Connor McDavid of the Edmonton Oilers won the Hart Trophy as NHL most valuable player at the 2017 NHL Awards and NHL Expansion Draft presented by T-Mobile in Las Vegas on Wednesday.
The 20-year-old center is the third-youngest player in League history to win the Hart. Wayne Gretzky (1980) and Sidney Crosby (2007) each won the award at age 19. The other finalists were Crosby and Columbus Blue Jackets goalie Sergei Bobrovsky.
McDavid led the League with 100 points (30 goals, 70 assists) in 82 games in his first full NHL season, winning the Art Ross Trophy and helping the Oilers qualify for the Stanley Cup Playoffs for the first time since 2005-06. McDavid also won the Ted Lindsay Award, given annually to the most outstanding player in the NHL, as voted by fellow members of the NHL Players' Association.
The Edmonton captain had nine points (five goals, four assists) in 13 playoff games, but the Oilers were eliminated by the Anaheim Ducks in seven games in the Western Conference Second Round.
Selected by Edmonton with the first pick in the 2015 NHL Draft, McDavid missed 37 games as a rookie in 2015-16 because of a broken clavicle. He had 48 points (16 goals, 32 assists) in 45 games and was a finalist for the Calder Trophy as rookie of the year, losing to Chicago Blackhawks forward Artemi Panarin.
Crosby, 29, led the NHL with 44 goals and was second behind McDavid with 89 points in 75 games. He missed the first six games of the season because of a concussion.
Bobrovsky, 28, led the League with a 2.06 goals-against average and .932 save percentage, and was third with 41 wins in 63 games. He won the Vezina Trophy as best goaltender in the NHL for the second time in his career earlier Wednesday.
Pts. (1st-2nd-3rd-4th-5th)
- Connor McDavid, EDM 1604 (147-17-3-0-0)
- Sidney Crosby, PIT 1104 (14-119-19-11-3)
- Sergei Bobrovsky, CBJ 469 (4-17-40-29-23)
- Brent Burns, SJS 273 (1-3-25-29-30)
- Erik Karlsson, OTT 258 (0-5-28-23-14)
- Patrick Kane, CHI 206 (0-3-20-20-25)
- Brad Marchand, BOS 184 (1-1-14-22-31)
- Nikita Kucherov, TBL 119 (0-0-11-15-19)
- Nicklas Backstrom, WSH 60 (0-0-3-11-12)
- Braden Holtby, WSH 19 (0-0-2-3-0)
- Auston Matthews, TOR 17 (0-0-2-1-4)
- Alex Ovechkin, WSH 7 (0-1-0-0-0)
Ryan Suter, MIN 7 (0-1-0-0-0) - Victor Hedman, TBL 5 (0-0-0-1-2)
- Devan Dubnyk, MIN 4 (0-0-0-1-1)
Vladimir Tarasenko, STL 4 (0-0-0-1-1) - Cam Atkinson, CBJ 1 (0-0-0-0-1)
Cam Talbot, EDM 1 (0-0-0-0-1)
