Can Matvei Michkov still win the Calder Trophy this season?

3 weeks ago  /  Broad Street Hockey  /  Read Time: 6 minutes 12 seconds

The 2024-25 season officially ends after games played April 17. But between now and then there’s still a bit of a dog fight for the Calder Trophy, awards to the NHL Rookie of the Year. There are three skaters (Philadelphia’s Matvei Michkov, San Jose’s Macklin Celebrini, Montreal’s Lane Hutson) and a goaltender (Calgary’s Dustin Wolf) who seem to be the favorites to win it. And with Michkov possibly putting a drive on these remaining six games, he could end up leading all rookies in scoring and NOT end up taking the trophy home. Of course, Michkov made his mark earlier in the season against San Jose when he popped Celebrini and took a minor for it.



obsessed with the way michkov gets celebrini in the face twice and then immediately throws hands as if hes done nothing wrong pic.twitter.com/twSbhmsxGZ— bry (@chicletsbian) November 12, 2024



Like any award, a variety of factors go into deciding who wins and who doesn’t. Barring injuries Celebrini should end up playing the fewest amount of games. But a deeper dive shows he’s averaged roughly three-minutes and change more time on ice per game than Michkov (1198:49) despite the early season injury. And following Sunday night’s game against Los Angeles, Celebrini still has a slim edge in total time on ice. Yet both have miles to go to hit the average ice time Lane Hutson is receiving on the back end. If Michkov had a similar amount of ice time to Celebrini and had played on a marginally average power play, it’s possible Michkov would be walking away with this now. But it didn’t happen.



Meanwhile, Calgary’s stellar young goaltender Dustin Wolf has done an admirable job trying to keep the Flames in the wild card hunt. Wolf is tied for 10th in save percentage (.909) and a goals-against average of 2.67. However, he’s tailed off somewhat the last two months. In December, Wolf had a .925 save percentage, and .922 in January. Since then, he’s fallen off a bit, posting an .892 save percentage in February and .895 in March, including his last six games seeing him with six consecutive save percentages under .900. So, unless Wolf goes on a Brian Boucher-esque shutout streak to get Calgary in, it appears that Wolf’s name might not be mentioned as often. A good season but it appears he’d be hard pressed to end up being one of the three final nominees for the Calder.



So, for starters, here are the stats for the three skaters: (Note: the CF%, xGF, xGF%, and HDCF% statistics are all based on 5-on-5 play.)



NameGamesTOIGoalsAssistsPointsPP Points+/-CF%xGFxGF%HDCF%Matvei Michkov731215:49 (16:25 per game)24345815-1348.8444.1853.7350.30Macklin Celebrini611205:17 (19:45 per game)21325320-3249.1738.3748.0346.33Lane Hutson731651:16 (22:37 per game)5545925-951.0065.1650.9350.09



Matvei Michkov



Michkov has six games remaining, four on the road and two at home. Of the six teams the Flyers will face in those games, Michkov hasn’t recorded a point against just one (the Rangers). But he has multiple points against three other opponents, including four points against Buffalo, three points against Montreal and two assists in three games against Columbus. With a power play that has scored three times in the last two games (boosting the horrid power play up to 14.7 per cent), Michkov could see his production increase a bit if the power play gets a little bit hot (words I never thought I’d say this season).



Another obvious aspect which can’t be measured in analytics but seems to be making a small difference in an even smaller sample size is the coaching change. With John Tortorella a recent memory, the attention to detail is still a must for the Flyers but making a mistake isn’t going to see players benched or scratched as much as they were. Whether this stretch run sees Michkov end up with 60 or 65 points at season’s end is unclear. But it should be exciting to see what he’s able to do with a little more of a leash courtesy of Brad Shaw. On the flipside, Michkov has 43 even-strength points, leading all rookies in that stat.









In short, Michkov has had a heck of a season, especially considering his average time on ice is drastically less than both Celebrini’s and Hutson’s. As well, Montreal’s power play ranks 18th and San Jose is 22nd, executing five to seven per cent higher than Philadelphia’s. And of course there’s the two games he was a healthy scratch which didn’t help much. So Michkov has some time to make some noise, but it’s no guarantee even that would get him over his Calder competition.



Macklin Celebrini



Following Sunday’s 8-1 thrashing by the Kings against San Jose, Celebrini has nine games remaining. Four of them are at home (Edmonton twice, Calgary, and Seattle) and five road tilts (Anaheim, Minnesota, Edmonton, Calgary, and Vancouver). However, one key component could be Celebrini’s ice time. On Sunday night Celebrini had his third lowest playing time of the season (16:00) and his lowest since Jan. 14 against Detroit. If San Jose are getting trashed like they did over the weekend (losing two games by a combined 14-2 goal total), Celebrini might not be getting the 19 or 20 minutes he’s almost been guaranteed most of the year.



What makes the homestretch so interesting for San Jose is that roughly half of the games should have playoff or playoff seeding implications for the opposition. Heading into Monday’s games Edmonton (who the Sharks play three times during this stretch) is two points back of Los Angeles and are trying to get home ice advantage from Los Angeles (who are an incredible 27-4-4 at home). Adding both Connor McDavid and Leon Draisatl back to Edmonton’s lineup can’t be good news for San Jose. Meanwhile Minnesota is tied with the Blues for wild card seeding and hope to gain every possible point to most likely avoid Winnipeg in the opening round. Elsewhere, San Jose faces Anaheim and Seattle, who are eliminated. And they face Calgary twice and Vancouver, both teams still mathematically in it but need a lot of help to get in.



Celebrini has four points against Seattle, three against the Wild, two goals against Calgary and two helpers against Vancouver. He has yet to face Anaheim (he was injured earlier in the season) and a lone point against Edmonton. If Celebrini falls off a cliff the rest of the nine games and Michkov catches fire, it’s conceivable Michkov could win the Calder. But both he and Celebrini have another skater to contend with.



Lane Hutson



Montreal’s Lane Hutson has played a whole lot, with roughly 450 minutes more playing time than Celebrini and Michkov. He’s been a workhorse for Montreal, often easily eclipsing 24 to 25 minutes (including a ridiculous 30 minutes against Los Angeles in October). Although with a respectable amount of goals for a rookie defenseman, Hutson has made his mark with assists (tied for ninth with 54). He’s also had 25 power play points.



The Canadiens have nine games left: six at home (Florida, Boston, Flyers, Detroit, Chicago, and Carolina) and three on the road (Nashville, Ottawa, Toronto). He has had four assists against Florida, three assists against the Bruins, a pair of helpers against Philadelphia, three assists against Detroit, and a point against Carolina. He has done nothing against the lowly Blackhawks in one game. Meanwhile he has one assist against the Predators, a pair of assists against Toronto and a goal and three assists against Ottawa. Needless to say, he can put up points against damn near any team he faces.



Four of Montreal’s opponents are (or will shortly be) eliminated from the playoffs (Flyers, Boston, Chicago and Nashville). The other five will be in the playoff chase with Ottawa. Florida is playing for seeding while Toronto is hoping to lock down a division title. Only Ottawa and Carolina are teams that have buffer space from wild card teams but can’t really nab teams ahead of them. But with Montreal in the chase, every game will be crucial.



Comparing Hutson to both rookie forwards is probably unfair. But Hutson has definitely made a case for winning the Calder over both Michkov and Celebrini with his production and the amount of minutes he’s eaten up. Montreal is still hanging in the wildcard race with the Rangers, Columbus, Islanders, and Detroit still in the hunt. And it seems a lot of their playoff hopes rest with how well their blueline (particularly Hutson) rises to the challenge. Oddly enough, Hutson has more points on the road (34) versus home (25) and has a sizable gap in plus-minus between the road (plus-13) and home (minus-22).



So who wins?



While it would be great for the Flyers fan base to see Michkov take home an award in his rookie year, it might be Hutson’s to lose at this point. The demands of the position is far more difficult than a forward. And Hutson has played that position well in his first year. At the same time Hutson’s having an almost equal or greater amount of production. If the tax man didn’t repossess my crystal ball recently I would say it’s Lane Hutson’s to lose. Of course, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be rooting for Michkov to pile 10 to 15 points together in these remaining games to make the decision much more difficult. But piling up a lot of points though sometimes doesn’t mean much. Just ask Claude Giroux after his 2017-18 season. ...

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