5 players that can win the Calder Trophy with Connor Bedard out

The Chicago Blackhawks are going to be without Connor Bedard for 6-8 weeks. He injured his jaw in a game last week and now he had successful surgery to repair it.

Bedard was the clear frontrunner for the Calder Trophy as the league's top rookie. He has 15 goals and 18 assists for 33 points in 39 games played. He is the youngest player in the league which makes this very good offensive production.

Now, there are going to be close to two months without him so a lot of players are going to be involved in the Calder Trophy race.

There are some really good rookies in this league right now and it won't take them long to close the gap with Bedard playing no games for a while. These are the five rookies that can be the Calder Trophy winner with Bedard out:

Luke Hughes of the Devils is in the best Calder Trophy spot right now

Luke Hughes is a defenseman who is amongst the rookie scoring leaders. It has been a very good season for him so far. His New Jersey Devils have dealt with some terrible injury luck as well this season but he has managed to put up points.

The points have started to come in even more over the last handful of weeks. He has taken over as the top offensive defenseman on the team and it shows in the stats.

Right now, Hughes has 7 goals and 16 assists for 23 points. He is a teenage blue-liner who is the fourth-leading rookie scorer. He has an amazing case to be known as the best rookie of the season.

There have been "teenage defenseman" mistakes but he has overall been good at defending as well. The Devils have a superstar in the making.

They also have a very interesting second half of the season coming up. If they are going to stay in the race with their injury luck, Luke Hughes is going to be a big part of it.