Updated 2025 Calder Trophy Rankings for the NHL's Best Rookie

As we wrap up the NHL regular season, we have a better picture of who this year's crop of rookies are as players. It's only natural, then, that we update our Calder Trophy rankings and figure out which one of the fresh-faced members of the league has played the best this season.

Something important to keep in mind: The Calder Trophy is awarded "to the player selected as the most proficient in his first year of competition in the National Hockey League." So not necessarily the guy who will turn out to be the best overall, but the guy who has the best season during his first year in the league.

Fun fact: Our top three players for this list—the ones who are, as best we can tell, considered the front-runners—all play different positions. It's nice to see the breadth of talent in the league represented so widely, rather than voters having to choose between three high-octane forwards made from the same mold.

Is Logan Stankoven the best rookie in the league this season? No. Will he get one of the coveted finalist slots? Probably not. But Stankoven has forced people to pay attention to him nonetheless.

He was terrific for the Dallas Stars, and very quickly made himself at home in Raleigh when he was traded to the Carolina Hurricanes as part of the Mikko Rantanen deal. He fit in right away, taking no time at all to win over the fanbase.

Stankoven definitely has the right personality to be a long-term fit for Carolina, and that was noticeable from the start.

He sits sixth in rookie scoring with 35 points. Obviously 35 points in 70 games is not enough offense to win the Calder Trophy. But he grabbed people's attention this season and has made himself an important piece of his new franchise already.

That should be recognized. He has a relentless motor and fantastic puck skills. Combine that with his work ethic, and he is going to be a highly effective player for a long time.

Flyers forward Matvei Michkov should get that third Calder nomination if Dustin Wolf somehow doesn't snag one. Ahead of the start of the season, Michkov seemed like a shoo-in for the win, to say nothing of a nomination.

He's leading all rookies in goals scored with 24, and that number is likely to grow between now and the end of the regular season. Whatever the total ends up being, it likely would've been higher had Michkov been playing under any coach other than John Tortorella, who probably torpedoed Michkov's Calder chances with the way that he used him.

Obviously I'm no NHL coach, but if I had a kid with Michkov's shot on my roster I would have him on every power-play opportunity that was reasonable and let him figure out mistakes on the go. The Flyers weren't contenders this season anyway.

Michkov has a legitimate shot at the Calder regardless, simply because his talent is visible every time he steps onto the ice. This is because he's been making a late push since the Flyers fired Tortorella. In the three games since Brad Shaw took over as head coach, Michkov has seven points. Four of those are goals.

I am not a goalie person. I read other smart people's analysis about goalies and try to learn from them. And even I can see what Dustin Wolf is doing this season in Calgary is worthy of a higher level of attention.

He's got a legitimate shot at the Calder Trophy, and while he won't win it, he will almost certainly snag a nomination. And it will be deserved. Wolf has set himself up as a reliable starter in his first full season in the league and put the Flames in the chase for a playoff spot.

The 23-year-old is sitting at a 0.910 save percentage with 25 wins. He obviously leads all other rookie goaltenders. A fun stat for you: Wolf also has three assists this season. It's something that deserves a nod, because while we obviously don't want goalies gallivanting out to deliberately try to score at the expense of their nets, it speaks highly of his puck-handling abilities and his awareness of his teammates.

The three most recent goaltenders to win the Calder Trophy are Steve Mason (2009), Andrew Raycroft (2004) and Evgeni Nabokov (2001). We'll see this summer whether Wolf joins that list.

Lane Hutson seems like everyone else's odds-on favorite to win this thing, and while he may not be my pick, I will have absolutely no argument with the voters if he does win.

He's sitting at 62 points in 75 games, ahead of a few different Norris Trophy nominees (or winners). I want you to sit with that for a moment and let it soak in: Hutson broke the 60-point mark as a rookie.

He's only the 10th rookie defenseman in NHL history to do so. The last one was Nicklas Lidstrom. It's also higher than Quinn Hughes' rookie total of 53, which was the record for most points by a rookie defenseman in the 21st century.

Now, to be clear: He's still Lane Hutson. I still sometimes feel a migraine aura coming on while watching him play, because he likes to take risks. But the thing about Hutson is that more often than not, those risks tend to pay off, and the number of times they pay off is only going to increase as he gains experience.

He's also doing all of this while absorbing significant minutes for the Canadiens, which is a point in his favor.

Macklin Celebrini is a Calder front-runner on an, if you will excuse me, awful team. He's a future franchise centerpiece. And yet he probably isn't going to win the Calder in the end. It's possible that he goes on a scoring tear to close the season and makes the decision to pick someone else a little harder to justify, of course. And he is more than deserving.

Celebrini has 54 points in 63 games, and when looking at those numbers, one has to remember three things: one, he missed significant time; two, he is on a terrible team and shouldering a lot of pressure; and three, he hasn't even turned 19 yet.

It's an incredibly impressive season, regardless of whether it meets your expectations of what a rookie season from Macklin Celebrini should've been. He's a phenomenal two-way player—he's out there pulling off moves with an awareness I would expect from a veteran literally twice his age. He leads all rookies in points-per-game with 0.86. He's also second only to Matvei Michkov in goals with 21.

As undoubtedly the best pure player in the class, Celebrini could pull out the win. However, the award is for the best rookie season, which isn't necessarily the same thing. At this point it's really going to depend on the style preference of the voters. He's my pick, but I have no quibble with anyone else on this list winning.