Did NHL GMs Get the 2026 Vezina Trophy Finalists Right?

The NHL announced its three finalists for the Vezina Trophy as top goalie on Wednesday, as voted by the 32 general managers: Andrei Vasilevskiy of the Tampa Bay Lightning, Jeremy Swayman of the Boston Bruins and Ilya Sorokin of the New York Islanders.

That means it’s time for our annual deep dive into the numbers to see if they got it right.

A quick glance at the proprietary numbers from Clear Sight Analytics, a company founded and run by former NHL goalie Steve Valiquette, reveals the announced finalists finished second, seventh and 11th in Goals Saved Above Expected (GSAE), which uses 34 data points to measure shot quality and compares individual results to how an average NHL goalie would be “expected” to perform facing the same quality and quantity of shots. (We’re not going to tell you who finished where — have a guess, then see if you’re right.)

Given those statistics alone, you might think it would be easy to conclude the NHL GMs made a mistake in their voting. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time. But the truth is, this might have been one of the more complicated Vezina votes in recent memory.

Before digging into the numbers from Clear Sight Analytics and measuring each goalie’s performance relative to the quality of shots they faced, let’s look at the surface stats, organized by wins — the statistic GMs have traditionally valued the most in voting.