Can Ottawa Senators Goalie Craig Anderson Still Win The Vezina Trophy?

At the time of his injury on Feb 21, Craig Anderson was on a pace to capture the Vezina trophy as the NHL’s top goaltender. Has the fact that he missed 20 games in a 48 game season due to the injury taken away the chance for the Senators’ goaltender to raise some NHL hardware?

Apr 12, 2013; Newark, NJ, USA; Ottawa Senators goalie

Craig Anderson

(41) makes a glove save during the third period at the Prudential Center. The Senators defeated the Devils 2-0. Mandatory Credit: Ed Mulholland-USA TODAY Sports

I did a little research in to the past Vezina trophy winners to see if there is still a chance that Anderson could do enough to sway voters despite his lack of playing time.

Anderson has played in just 18 of Ottawa’s 41 games so far, and could play in up to 6 of the remaining 7 games. Although I don’t think the Senators would want to wear him out heading into the playoffs, and Robin Lehner is a capable backup. So to look conservatively, Anderson should probably play 5 of the last 7 to give him 23 of 48 games played, or just under 48% of his team’s games.

I wanted to see what history says. Since the Vezina Trophy became an award that was voted on in 1981-82 (it was given to the netminding team allowing the fewest goal against prior to that), here are the winners, and the percentage of their team’s games the winner started. I also include whether the winner led the league in Goals Against Average (GAA) and/or Save Percentage:

Year	VEZINA WINNER	GP	Team GP	% GP	Highest SP	Lowest GAA
81-82	Billy Smith	42	80	52.50	–	no
82-83	Pete Peeters	62	80	77.50	–	yes
83-84	Tom Barrasso	42	80	52.50	no	no
84-85	Pelle Lindbergh	65	80	81.25	no	no
85-86	John Vanbiesbrouck	61	80	76.25	no	no
86-87	Ron Hextall	66	80	82.50	yes	no
87-88	Grant Fuhr	75	80	93.75	no	no
88-89	Patrick Roy	48	80	60.00	yes	yes
89-90	Patrick Roy	54	80	67.50	yes	no
90-91	Ed Belfour	74	80	92.50	yes	yes
91-92	Patrick Roy	67	80	83.75	yes	yes
92-93	Ed Belfour	71	84	84.52	no	no
93-94	Dominik Hasek	58	84	69.05	yes	yes
94-95	Dominik Hasek	41	48	85.42	yes	yes
95-96	Jim Carey	71	82	86.59	no	no
96-97	Dominik Hasek	67	82	81.71	yes	no
97-98	Dominik Hasek	72	82	87.80	yes	no
98-99	Dominik Hasek	64	82	78.05	yes	no
99-00	Olaf Kolzig	73	82	89.02	no	no
00-01	Dominik Hasek	67	82	81.71	no	no
01-02	Jose Theodore	67	82	81.71	yes	no
02-03	Martin Brodeur	73	82	89.02	no	no
03-04	Martin Brodeur	75	82	91.46	no	no
04-05	none
05-06	Miikka Kiprusoff	74	82	90.24	no	yes
06-07	Martin Brodeur	78	82	95.12	no	no
07-08	Martin Brodeur	77	82	93.90	no	no
08-09	Tim Thomas	54	82	65.85	yes	yes
09-10	Ryan Miller	69	82	84.15	no	no
10-11	Tim Thomas	57	82	69.51	yes	yes
11-12	Henrik Lundqvist	62	82	75.61	no	no
12-13	???

So, as you can see, it has been 20 years since a goalie who has played less than 75% of their team’s games has gone on to win the Vezina Trophy. No goalie who has played less than 50% of his team’s games has ever won the Vezina trophy. The closest to that mark was 1981-82 and 1893-84 where Billy Smith and Tom Barrasso respectively won the award playing 52.5% of their team’s games.

So, what happens when a goalie leads the league in both SP and GAA? Well, it has happened 11 times where one goalie has accomplished both feats. Six times the goalie has gone on to win the Vezina, as listed above. What about the other 5? Well, it could be a factor of games played, as listed below.

Year	Player	GP	Team GP	% GP
11-12	Brian Elliott	38	82	46.34
09-10	Tuukka Rask	45	82	54.88
03-04	Mikka Kiprusoff	38	82	46.34
02-03	Marty Turco	55	82	67.07
00-01	Marty Turco	26	82	31.71

So judging by these facts, it would appear that Anderson is fighting an uphill battle in his quest for the Vezina. Games played will be a big factor, since the only time a player played more than 60 % of his team’s games and didn’t win the Vezina while leading the league in both statistical categories was Turco in 2002-03.

Even if Anderson plays all 7 of Ottawa’s remaining games, that would give him only 52% of his team’s games. While there is some recent precedent set for goalies (notably Tim Thomas) for not having a huge percentage of games played, Anderson’s 52% would be the lowest GP percentage to ever win the award, injury or no injury.

So Anderson has been arguably the best goalie in the NHL this season, the amount of time he missed due to injury will likely result in his being omitted from the honor when the ballots are submitted by the NHL’s General Managers.

Names that have been tossed around lately as contenders for the award include Sergei Bobrovsky, Carey Price, Antti Niemi, Niklas Backstrom, and Henrik Lundqvist.

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