By Stevie

The NHL Awards were just like any other award show: full of really horrible jokes and awkwardness.

Our own super star Evgeni Malkin ran away with a ton of hardware to add to his collection. Since the Pens’ season ended, he has earned a gold medal in the World Championship as well as the tournament MVP award, the Kharlamov Trophy (awarded to the best Russian player in the NHL), and was named the best forward in the World Championship.

Last night, he added even more to his collection: His second Art Ross Trophy, the Ted Lindsay Award, and his first Hart Trophy (which has has been a former finalist for, but it was awarded to Alexander Ovechkin).

As my son says, “Geno gets a lot of shoot and scores.” Congratulations to Geno!

Geno is a special player, and the fans in Pittsburgh should be proud to have him. His first speech last night for the Ted Lindsay Award displayed typical Geno. Jokes, happy, and genuinely grateful for the support of his parents, team and fans. But his Hart Speech, well that was from his heart and anyone who knows a lot about Geno’s life in Pittsburgh will have a great appreciation for what he said:

Thanking Gonch was about as honest as one can get. Since he arrived in Pittsburgh, Sergei Gonchar has been Geno’s rock. The Gonchar family took Geno in  and helped him to get acclimated to life in the United States.

Congratulations again to Malkin on all of his achievements. We are truly lucky here in Pittsburgh to have such a talent and all around good guy on our team.

Other notables:

Henrik Lundqvist: Vezina Trophy
Erik Karlsson: Norris Trophy
Gabriel Landeskog: Calder Trophy
Ken Hitchcock: Jack Adams Award
Patrice Bergeron: Selke Trophy
Brian Campbell: Lady Byng Trophy
Steven Stamkos: Richard Trophy

Also, Claude Giroux will be on the cover of EA Sports NHL 2013.

I will be at the draft this weekend and will bring coverage back to the site on Sunday (pics, video, etc).