State Your Case: Quinn Hughes, Josi or Makar for Norris Trophy

The Norris Trophy is given yearly to the highest defenseman within the NHL as voted on by the Skilled Hockey Writers Affiliation

This season, Quinn Hughes of the Vancouver Canucks, Roman Josi of the Nashville Predators and Cale Makar of the Colorado Avalanche are the finalists.

The award can be given to certainly one of these defensemen throughout the NHL Awards on June 27 on the Fontainebleau in Las Vegas (7 p.m. ET; ESPN, SN).

Whereas we wait to seek out out the winner, NHL.com writers Adam Kimelman, Mike Zeisberger and Mike G. Morreale debate the deserves of every finalist on this Awards version of State Your Case.

With all due respect to Cale Makar and Roman Josi, the Vancouver Canucks defenseman was the very best within the NHL this season for a workforce not many predicted would end second within the Western Convention. In his first season as captain of the Canucks, Hughes performed an enormous function by main all gamers at his place with 92 factors, 75 assists and 17 main power-play assists whereas averaging a team-high 24:41 in 82 video games to assist Vancouver (50-23-9) to its first 50-win season since 2011-12. He is the sixth defenseman in NHL historical past to have at the least 92 factors in a season by the age of 24 or youthful, and had 9 video games with at the least three assists, one thing solely two others on the place have performed in a single season: Bobby Orr (4 instances) and Ray Bourque (1993-94). This is one other stat that boggles the thoughts: Hughes is already second on the Canucks’ all-time scoring record amongst defensemen with 333 factors in 365 video games. Alexander Edler is first with 409 factors in 925 video games. Hughes additionally set the Canucks document for plus-minus in a single season (plus-38). Truth is, Hughes is likely one of the greatest skaters within the League, and that features all positions, and his hockey IQ will get higher and higher with age. Moreover, Vancouver managed 56.4 % of all pictures generated 5-on-5 when Hughes was on the ice this season, which ranked increased than Makar (52.8) and Josi (53.4). — Mike G. Morreale, senior draft author