Ilya Samsonov nominated for the Bill Masterton Trophy

PUBLICATION

Julien Trekker
April 5, 2024 (9:42)

SHARE THIS STORY

The Toronto Maple Leafs' goaltender Ilya Samsonov has been nominated for the Bill Masterton Trophy.

This award his given annually by the NHL to a player who showed perseverance, sportsmanship, and dedication to hockey. Each teams must nominate one player on their roster, and the Leafs decided to nominate Ilya Samsonov.

Samsonov has had his fair share of struggles this season. After a great playoff run last year, where he played an important role when the team eliminated the Tampa Bay Lightning in the first round of the playoffs, which earned him a one-year contract with the Leafs valued at $3.5M.

Unfortunately, he wasn't able to keep that level going into the season. After the first few months of the current campaign, his underwhelming performances forced the Leafs to send him down to the AHL for a few weeks.

However, he managed to find his confidence back quite quickly, and has been a rock since coming back with the Leafs. In 21 games since he was called back up from the Marlies, he won 16 times.

He overcame the adversity to get back in the right mindset to win in the NHL. This is what the Bill Masterton Trophy is all about.

Samsonov gets nominated by the Maple Leafs for the Bill Masterton award

Every team must submit a player for the award, and while a few players could've been nominated in Toronto, like Giordano, who lost his father and came back despite multiple injuries, at 40 years old; Samsonov truly deserves that trophy.

Among the other nominees across the NHL, there's Frederik Andersen, who missed several months with a blood clotting issue, but came back to put on great performances with the Carolina Hurricanes; Jonathan Drouin, in Colorado, who scored 50 points after a tough few years in Montreal; Sidney Crosby, for the usual reasons; Jonathan Quick, with the Rangers, who became the winningest U.S.-born goalie in NHL history at 38 years old; and Alex Pietrangelo, who performed well all season long despite taking a leave of absence to take care of his 5-year-old sick daughter.

You can read the full list of nominees here:

Do you think Ilya Samsonov deserves to win the Bill Masterton Trophy this season?