In a few weeks, the Professional Hockey Writers’ Association is going to vote on the Calder Trophy. While predicting their collective behaviour can be difficult – who could have imagined Alex Ovechkin making both the first and second All-Star teams at different positions in the same season? – it is unimaginable to me that anyone other than Mathew Barzal is going to win. Unfortunately, Brock Boeser’s challenge for the trophy was kind of ended in Monday’s Canucks-Islanders game, when Boeser suffered an injury to his back after being knocked through an open gate. He’ll likely miss the rest of the year or close enough to it to end his challenge.



There’d been a feeling all year in Vancouver that Boeser has been getting ignored when it came to Calder consideration. There’s a belief out west (generally) and in the Pacific time zone (particularly) that nobody back east pays any attention to what’s happening in the games that start...