2023 NHL Awards: Linus Ullmark Wins Vezina Trophy
By Jim Lynch
The Boston Bruins had the best regular season in NHL history this past year, and Linus Ullmark, Bruins goaltender took home the Vezina Trophy as the best net minder across the league.
2023 NHL Awards: Linus Ullmark Wins Vezina Trophy
Ullmark won the Vezina on Monday night beating out Connor Hellebuyck and Ilya Sorokin for the trophy. All three netminders had great seasons bu the General Managers across the league voted Ullmark as the best of the best.
Ullmark was 40-6-1 this season, additionally he had a goals against average of 1.89 and a save percentage of .938. Every night that Ullmark played, the Bruins were well positioned to win.
This is Ullmark’s second trophy of the season. He and Jeremy Swayman split the William M. Jennings Trophy this season as they allowed an NHL-low 177 goals this past season.
This is Ullmark’s first Vezina Trophy at the age of 29. He is the first Bruin to win the award since 2014 when Tuukka Rask won the award. Boston has been blessed with some great goaltenders over the past 20 years as Ullmark, Rask and Tim Thomas have all won the award since the salary cap era began. Thomas currently is the only Bruins goaltneder to win the award twice, so maybe Ullmark can join him next season.
Some past Vezina Trophy winners include Igor Shesterkin of the New York Rangers, Marc-Andre Fleury then with the Vegas Golden Knights and Andrei Vasilevskiy of the Tampa Bay Lightning.
The Bruins might not have gotten it done in the postseason, but it still is an incredible accomplishment winning the Vezina Trophy and taking home the Presidents’ Trophy. The Bruins will be back next season looking to bounce back after a tough round one loss to the Florida Panthers.
While the team might have lost a few big pieces in Taylor Hall and Nick Folingo the same day as the NHL Awards, Boston still does have a lot of pieces to lead them to success.