The Montreal Canadiens are off to a blazing start to the 2025-26 season with a 9-3-2 record, putting them at the top of the Atlantic Division standings with 20 points. This comes with the pressure to return to the playoffs.
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For the team’s young captain, Nick Suzuki, the pressure to win is also fueling his personal statistics and efforts. Not only is he seen as an integral piece of the core and its leader, but he could also be the frontrunner for the Selke Award as the NHL’s top defensive forward.
Canadiens Have a Proven Top-Line Centre
Just as fans had wanted, the rebuild has provided a young and exciting team to watch. Better still, the early success the team is enjoying is being fueled by their young core players; several are being considered potential individual NHL award nominees and even 2026 Olympic team material. Lane Hutson and his 13 points in 14 games are gaining him some traction as a possible addition to Team USA. Ivan Demidov is still the odds-on favourite to win the Calder Trophy as the NHL’s top rookie.
Craig Button, on The Sick Podcast, discussed Suzuki as one of the NHL’s top centres and his evolution into the NHL’s newest elite two-way centre of one of the NHL’s top lines. Partially because of this, Suzuki is seen as an early favourite for the Selke Trophy. An award that originally was used to reward the league’s top defensive forward, however, the trophy has evolved into an award for the top two-way forward, as point totals and offence are seemingly factored into the votes now.
No one that has won has scored fewer than 20 goals since Ron Francis won in 1995, and the winner has been at a point per game or close to it every time. The exceptions are Patrice Bergeron’s six wins, but he is considered to be a first-ballot Hall of Famer who was considered to be an elite two-way centre and known for his defensive intelligence, positioning, and skill in taking faceoffs (winning over 60% consistently). In the last two seasons, Florida Panthers centre Aleksander Barkov has been the Selke Award winner. He was seen as instrumental in helping the Panthers become one of the NHL’s top 10 clubs in goals-against per game, penalty-killing percentage, and shots-against per game in those seasons.
Canadiens Next Selke Winner?
His chances at a three-peat for the Selke are no longer in the cards as a preseason injury has quashed Barkov’s regular season and possibly even his hopes to return during the playoffs. Without him being on the ballot as the best-known choice, the door is wide open for others to step in, and Suzuki — who last season finished 13th in voting for the Selke Trophy — is having the start to a season that could get him there.
He’s off to an outstanding offensive start for Montreal, with 19 points in his first 14 games to sit fourth in the league, and has been incredibly consistent, already earning himself a 12-game point streak. Defensively, he is a stalwart; this sequence highlights some of his strong play that doesn’t show on the scoresheet but makes a difference in a game.
He wins a faceoff, then blocks the shot. What isn’t seen is the situation. The Canadiens are shorthanded with seven seconds left in overtime. This sequence took away a golden opportunity for the Philadelphia Flyers to win the game outright and gave Montreal the opportunity to try and get a win. While Montreal ended up losing the game in the shootout, it’s another example of the importance Suzuki has for this roster.
Suzuki has helped the NHL’s youngest team to the fifth-ranked power play (29.3%), the 16th-ranked penalty kill (78%), and is steadily improving as well in shots against per game (11th, 27.1). The Canadiens allow only 1.03 goals against per 60 minutes when Suzuki is on the ice, but there’s more to it. It’s also partially about the impact a player has, and RG.org created a novel way to look at impact by focusing strictly on five-on-five play to see which player’s presence makes the biggest difference to his team’s results.
Suzuki has “put in his time”, “paid his dues”, or any other cliche one could use to show he has done everything to demonstrate what brings as a two-way forward. Looking at that history, Suzuki has not missed a game in the regular season since his rookie season (2019-20), where he played in 71 games. This focuses on just the last three seasons (246 games), so it isn’t a small sample size. At five-on-five with Suzuki on the ice, Montreal scored 194 goals and allowed 167; a plus-27 differential. Without him, the team’s numbers suffered greatly: 287 scored and 378 allowed, a negative-91 differential. That gives Suzuki a net impact of plus-119 – a clear sign he drives Montreal’s results at even strength. This also places him fifth overall in the NHL over that time, and he is the top centre on the list.
Suzuki is on the right track so far this season on both sides of the puck. He is being considered for Team Canada’s Olympic roster, and with some of the historic front-runners now out of the picture, he has an open track and a golden opportunity to add some individual honours as he strives to help lead his team from rebuild to eventually, a Stanley Cup contender.
