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Andrei Vasilevskiy, Ben Bishop, and Robin Lehner were recently announced as the finalists for the Vezina. In this edition of the hotstove, we share our picks for the award.
Todd Cordell
I'll go with Robin Lehner, although I don't feel strongly about any of the three. It's a pretty close race with very little separating any of the candidates.
My reasoning is simple. Lehner's numbers were similarly good even though the Islanders allowed scoring chances and expected goals at a higher rate than the Lightning and Stars. That's the difference for me.
Personally, I would have gone with John Gibson. He posted the same 5v5 save percentage as Vasilevskiy, and finished just below Lehner/Bishop, despite playing behind a god awful Ducks team that left him completely hung out to dry more often than not. If not for Gibson, I believe the Ducks would have finished bottom-3.
James Tanner
The Vezina nominations are out and once again, they are a complete joke. Robin Lehner is a good choice, but he only played 46 games, and he should be sharing a co-nomination with Tomas Griess. Andre Vasilevskiy played for the best and luckiest team in hockey, and he should not be on this list. As for Bishop, he had a fine season but also is undeserving.
The proper choices for Vezina finalist would be Lehner/Greiss along with Frederik Andersen (he plays behind a run and gun team and he is the reason they can run and gun) and Darcy Keumper.
Darcy Kuemper has crazy statistics and he did it playing in front of a team that, if not for him, easily would have been last in the NHL. He took the last place team (check out their injuries) and almost got them into the playoffs in the last weekend of the season. Had his team not went on a four-game road trip and scored only four goals in the final week of the season, he'd have personally gotten the worst team in hockey into the playoffs. His omission is an abomination. He should win the Vezina. Or Andersen, or even John Gibson. You can't give it to a guy who didn't even play 50 games, even though Lehner has been the best. However, of the nominees, Lehner should win. He should be sharing it with Greiss though.
Peter Tessier
Give the Vezina to Lehner. Given the talent or lack thereof on the Islanders, compared to the other two teams with nominees, Tampa and Dallas. In fact who cares if Greiss was almost equally as good as Lehner right?
That's where this will fall apart for Lehner in some voters minds and while I think he's deserving I don't expect him to win based on the performance of that duo. So... Bishop wins and that's cool but what Lehner and Greiss did should not go unnoticed or unheralded.
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