NHL’s Selke Trophy Finalists Named; Who Deserves The Hardware?

Bruce from The Copper & Blue dives into the advanced stats to provide some interesting insights into the relative merits of this season’s three Selke Trophy finalists. According to McCurdy:

First of all, the similarities. All three are big-minute centres, ranking 1st, 2nd and 3rd respectively on their teams in TOI, in keeping with their primary roles on the 1st, 2nd and 3rd lines respectively. All three lead their squads in Shifts per game, which suggests extra defensive assignments for Kesler and Staal. All three had very similar offensive production at even strength, with the discrepancy in their overall totals due to Staal’s lack of powerplay time and production. All three have very solid plus numbers in Relative Corsi despite facing competition and ZoneStarts that are well above team averages in all cases.

Too much to digest? McCurdy analyzes all of the numbers before casting his vote.

Find out why each player is worthy of the title below.

PAVEL DATSYUK, Detroit Red Wings