A 17-year-old youth honored last summer as the nation's safest teen-age driver may have fallen asleep at the wheel before his car slammed into another car, killing him and another person, the police said today.

The driver, Michael Doucette, of Concord, and the driver of the other car, Sharon Ann Link, 19, of Lebanon, were pronounced dead at the scene. The accident occurred Friday shortly after 5 P.M., the police said.

Mr. Doucette's car, which he was awarded in the driving competition, drifted over the center line and struck Ms. Link's car, the police report on the accident said. It appeared Ms. Link tried to avoid the oncoming car, as the collision happened at the extreme right side of her lane.

The report by the state police said a preliminary investigation showed that Mr. Doucette ''may have fallen asleep at the wheel.'' The police in Henniker said today that no further information on the accident would be released until the investigation is finished.