Maurice Richard Trophy Tournament (1995-Present) Round 1: 2004 Rick Nash vs 2004 Jarome Iginla vs 2004 Ilya Kovalchuk

[blundluntman]

MATCHUP #14 (Round 1): Rick Nash (2004) vs Jarome Iginla (2004) Ilya Kovalchuk (2004)

Rick Nash (2003-04):

Games Played	Goals	Even Strength Goals	Power Play Goals	League Wide Goals Per Game
80	41	22	19	2.57

Jarome Iginla (2003-04):

Games Played	Goals	Even Strength Goals	Power Play Goals	League Wide Goals Per Game
81	41	29	8	2.57

Ilya Kovalchuk (2003-04):

Games Played​	Goals​	Even Strength Goals​	Power Play Goals​	League Wide Goals Per Game​
81​	41​	24​	16​	2.57​

Round 1 Matchups
24 Matthews vs 97 Tkachuk Thread
23 McDavid vs 17 Crosby Thread
22 Matthews vs 06 Cheechoo Thread
21 Matthews vs 16 Ovechkin Thread
20 Pastrnak vs 20 Ovechkin Thread
19 Ovechkin vs 18 Ovechkin Thread
15 Ovechkin vs 12 Stamkos Thread
14 Ovechkin vs 09 Ovechkin Thread
13 Ovechkin vs 95 Bondra (Still Active) Thread
11 Perry vs 00 Bure Thread
10 Stamkos vs 10 Crosby Thread
08 Ovechkin vs 01 Bure Thread
07 Lecavalier vs 02 Iginla Thread
04 Nash vs 04 Iginla vs 04 Kovalchuk
03 Hejduk vs 96 Lemieux
99 Selanne vs 98 Bondra

Note: Due to the Richard Trophy not having a tiebreaker, I will conduct one myself in the first round to avoid matchup complications in later rounds.

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[Letsdothis]

Three-way-tie to the worst Rocket in history.

 

[Regal]

I’m leaning toward Iginla. Kovalchuk was on a more offensive styled team, and played huge minutes, especially on the PP, whereas Calgary was a very defensive team under Sutter. Nash is an interesting one. He didn’t play big minutes at ES but was still behind Iginla in ES scoring rate, but was way ahead of both in terms of PP efficiency. The Jackets were also a terrible team who didn’t score much, though that might have led to more garbage time goals for him. At the same time I have a hard time putting him at 19 ahead of prime Iginla in terms of goal scoring.

 

[Evergreen]

Nash doing what he did with that Columbus roster was most impressive to me. Iginla had the most support. Kovalchuk had Heatley and Savard (although those two both missed time).

 

[Video Nasty]

What’s interesting is that each of the three Rocket winners scored more goals combined than the second and third players on their respective teams. Three winners is also a good example of why this trophy has lesser value than the other main individual hardware.

I’m leaning Nash. He was only 19, Columbus was second to last in goals scored, and surrounded by the least talented group of players.

 

[jigglysquishy]

Three-way-tie to the worst Rocket in history.

It's an interesting question so I looked into it.

By Vs5 the only Rockets under 1.10 since expansion are

Gare/Simmer 1980 - 1.10
Selanne 1999 - 1.09
Tkachuk 1997 - 1.08
Iginla/Sakic/Nash - 1.08

Rather unsurprisingly, the four seasons include two ties and one injury season (Selanne)

Conversely, the ones over 1.50 are

Season	Rocket Richard	Goals	5th	Goals2	Percentage	Goal Spread	Vs5
1970-71	Phil Esposito	76​	Dennis Hull	40​	90.00%​	36​	1.90​
1990-91	Brett Hull	86​	Mike Gartner	49​	75.51%​	37​	1.76​
1981-82	Wayne Gretzky	92​	Rick Vaive	54​	70.37%​	38​	1.70​
1983-84	Wayne Gretzky	87​	Jari Kurri	52​	67.31%​	35​	1.67​
1988-89	Mario Lemieux	85​	Joe Mullen	51​	66.67%​	34​	1.67​
2011-12	Steven Stamkos	60​	Alex Ovechkin	38​	57.89%​	22​	1.58​
1991-92	Brett Hull	70​	Pat LaFontaine	46​	52.17%​	24​	1.52​
2007-08	Alex Ovechkin	65​	Henrik Zetterberg	43​	51.16%​	22​	1.51​

 

[tabness]

I remember some game when the CBJ were playing the Wings late that season that Ken Daniels was talking about the Nash/Kovalchuk goal scoring race (don't remember Iggy being mentioned maybe he came on strong late) and the great Mickey Redmond mentioned that Kovalchuk was the better player compared to sophomore Nash.

Yes, Mickey was right in general but in terms of goal scoring I'm going with man on an island Rick Nash