NHL Announces Cheveldayoff, Nill And Zito As GM Of The Year Finalists
The NHL announced the finalists for the Jim Gregory GM of the Year Award on Friday.
The Winnipeg Jets' Kevin Cheveldayoff, Dallas Stars' Jim Nill and Florida Panthers' Bill Zito are the final three up for the award, which goes to the league's most outstanding GM.
While most of the NHL's awards are voted on right after the regular season, the league's GMs and a panel of executives, print and broadcast media voted for the Jim Gregory Award after the second round of the playoffs.
Two of these GMs are still in the playoffs, while the other led his squad to the Presidents' Trophy.
In fact, Cheveldayoff's Jets not only finished atop the regular-season standings for the first time in franchise history, but they had their best regular season record as well, with a 56-22-4 record and 116 points.
Cheveldayoff followed up on a fourth-place finish and first-round exit last year by promoting coach Scott Arniel to replace Rick Bowness as bench boss. Arniel is a Jack Adams finalist.
The GM also acquired left winger Brandon Tanev and defenseman Luke Schenn at the NHL trade deadline. Schenn had 59 hits and one point in the playoffs, while Tanev had 44 hits.
Nill's Stars eliminated the Jets in six games during the second round and are back in the Western Conference final for the third straight season. Nill also has a chance at winning the Jim Gregory Award for the third straight time as well after earning the honor in 2022-23 and 2023-24.
Nill brought on Mikael Granlund and Cody Ceci in February. Granlund has nine points in the playoffs so far, and Ceci has three.
But the biggest move of the trade deadline brought Mikko Rantanen to the Stars from the Carolina Hurricanes, and Nill signed the superstar to an eight-year contract extension. Rantanen now leads the NHL in playoff scoring, with 20 points in 14 games.
The Hurricanes, meanwhile, currently trail Nito's Panthers 2-0 in the Eastern Conference final.
Zito and the Panthers won the first Stanley Cup championship in franchise history last season. Although they lost Brandon Montour, Oliver Ekman-Larsson and Anthony Stolarz in free agency, he brought in depth players Nate Schmidt, A.J. Greer, Tomas Nosek and Jesper Boqvist while later acquiring star defenseman Seth Jones and former Boston Bruins captain Brad Marchand around the trade deadline.
Zito is a finalist for the GM of the Year award for the third straight time and trails only Nill for most finalist berths since the award was introduced in 2009-10.
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