The NHL Awards were awarded tonight and Victor Hedman walked away with his much deserved first Norris Trophy. When the full voting breakdown was released, there was a surprise waiting for Flyers fans in the top ten. In the history of the Philadelphia Flyers, there has not been one Norris Trophy winner. Yet.
Norris Trophy voting breakdown pic.twitter.com/HPy1Slo9yT
— Sean Leahy (@Sean_Leahy) June 21, 2018
It’s Shayne Gostisbehere! Of the Philadelphia Flyers! We all already know just how talented Ghost is, we have the privlidge of watching him play every single game. What we didn’t know is that the Professional Hockey Writers Association is also paying attention to our golden boy. Ghost received four third place votes, two fourth place votes, and five fifth place votes for a total of thirty-one points. All voters cast five votes, each worth a different value, for the purpose of tie breakers.
This isn’t the first time Gostisbehere has shown up on the Norris awards ballots, in 2015-16 he earned one fourth place vote. You may remember that year as the year Artemi “no I’ve never played pro hockey before, I swear this is my first year” Panarin stole the Calder Trophy from the rightful winner, Shayne Gostisbehere.
With 65 points in 78 regular season games facing more difficult competition than he has in his prior two seasons in the NHL, you can see why people would be paying attention. We can debate all day about who the better defenseman is between Gostisbehere and Ivan Provorov, but as it stands right now, at least according to the PHWA, the Flyers have a top ten defenseman in the NHL.
